Old Logs and Maintenance stuff

I ran across our old logs the other day. There is so much good stuff here for both the average Hans Christian owner and those that think they might actually want to purchase and old boat that I thought I would include it. Be aware that this is a work in progress. I am placing it here on 3/7/2011. The formatting is not perfect and the pictures that use to accompany the log are not sticking to the pages.

As the weeks go on I will use my spare time to try and bring this page up to something that at least resembles the other pages of the site. The links below look like they work, but that is more an illusion between MS Word and the Website builder we are using. You will have to manually move down the page to find the content.

esigned by Harword Ives, the following is an excerpt of
comments by the designer in 1979:The
Hans Christian line of cruising boats carriers a Danish heredity in their
designs.I spent considerable time in
both Norway and Denmark
studying the lines of their early cruising boats to identify those features
that made them sea kindly and easily handled.In particular I was drawn to Aage Nielsen’s design of Helge Danske as a
representation of a Danish sailboat able to put up with the rigors of the North Sea.

Beyond Reason has had 2 previous owners and 2 previous
names.The original owner was Robert
Webster and the original name was Restless.The vessel was repurchased by Bonnie
Gilmore and Chuck Rust in 1999and subsequently
renamed Southern Cross.

In October 2002, Bill
and Lisa Novak purchased Southern Cross and re-named her Beyond Reason.

The following is an account of the adventures of boat and
crew; Beyond Reason.

In February of 2002, a new fuel
polishing system was added to Beyond Reason.The theory behind fuel polishing is to continually circulate the entire
contents of both fuel tanks through deep filtration strata prior to the fuel
entering the main engine filter system.On Beyond Reason this is currently be accomplished through the use of a
Walbro 6802 continuous duty diesel fuel pump connected through copper piping to
a Gulf Coast O-1 JR fuel filter.

All
plumbing is hard walled and each system separated by a series of valves giving the
owner the ability to isolate the polishing system from the main engine filters
or allow them to work in concert with each other.

During March of 2003, we entered into a contract with Joe
Winkler to do renovation of both mast and all 3 booms.The work to be accomplished on the mast
would include, removal of all hardware, completed stripping of previous paint
and primer, sanding to bare shinny aluminum and following approval by the
owners, re-priming, re-painting and re-assembly of hardware.Svensons Boat Works in Alameda California
did the mast removal and re-stepping/tuning.

All work was completed
on 16 May 2003
with final rigging of lines done during the weekend of 17 – 18 May 2003.During the process there was significant
heartburn with the work being done on the masts.

For two months I had to commute
from work to the boat, to home and back to work.Without monitoring of the work being done, I
would guess the job still might have taken more than 6 months to complete, if
ever.

Stripping of the mast was done
completely by hand using Jasco paint remover allowed to sit for 15 minutes then
lightly scrapping the covered area.It
was important to do small 4 to 5 foot sections to assure that the smallest
particles of paint were removed.

It was interesting to see the
original paint come off.There was no
indication of a primer ever being used on the spars, only filler (blue) and the
original paint.

.

Following the completion
of the paint stripping, we sanded all spars with 120 grit dry sandpaper.It was easier and less mess than the wet and
dry and gave a good bite to the paint when completed.For the really deep and tough final paint
removal we moved to sand blasting.I was
amazed to see what little effect the sand had on places where the paint had not
been completely removed.We went
through hundreds of pounds of sand.If I
ever have to do this again I will be sure to invest in a good blaster.The equipment we used was outdated and not
in the best repair but the results were very nice.

Once the prep was completed the
masts were etched using an Alodine product that dulled my new shinny masts to a
light tan color.Believe it when the
instructions say it will burn the metal quickly.The process required a minimum of 2 people,
but we should have had 4 to do the job more easily.

I think I really got lucky when
we hired the painter.His equipment was
old but in good repair and professional.

The painting went very
quickly, taking just one day and night to complete.We had plenty of primer so a full 3 coats of
Awlgrip MIL-P-23377D went on both masts, 3 booms and 4 spreaders.The insides of the booms and what could be
shot into the mast (especially the bases) where coated also.Once the primer had “gassed off” the Top Coat
of linear polyurethane was applied in 3 additional coats.Recommended coating is 1 to 2 coats, but we
had plenty to go around, so we sprayed into the evening.

No filler was used on any of the
spars, as I felt that filling pits provided no additional strength to the
spars, and I didn’t want to find out that I had missed any areas of corrosion
10 years after it had continued to eat into the aluminum

In all 420 rivets were replaced
and 310 old rivet holes where tapped and screwed.Under each track was placed fiberglass backed
Teflon tape to prevent electrolysis.All
rivets and Stainless fasteners where coated with Lanocoat or Life Seal caulk as
a corrosion preventative.Although the
original rivets in the mast track were aluminum, they were replaced in
Stainless steel at the advise of several top riggers to include those at
Svensons.The rivets in the main mast
track had to be replaced with ¼ 20 SS screws as rivets 1.5 inches long are not
made in Stainless

Total cost of the work ran
approximately $6000.00, a savings of 50% over the yard bill quoted several
months earlier.I would think twice
before doing the job again.

As early April 2003 rolled around
the weather began to improve and the removal of the previous owners Cytol was
a requirement to keep the boat looking in top condition.The choices of covering for teak are amazing
and all the proprietary claims make the choice a difficult one.

After weeks of comparisons and
web browsing we made the obvious choice to switch to Bristol Finish.There have been many write-ups regarding Bristol and the one key
comparison test was done in the XXXX issue of
Practical Sailor.

We had used Bristol on a previous boat so the decision
was not as difficult as I make it out to be.

The firsts process was
the removal of all the old Cytol and sanding to bare teak.This process was accelerated by the use of
Citrus Strip.Citrus Strip is an
environmentally friendly product that will soften Cytol in a short time.

The total time required to strip
the outside bulwarks was 5 hours.Because of late arriving April weatherwe were delayed another two weeks before we could proceed to the final
filling and caulking.

Caulking was done with Life Caulk
Teak Seal after penetrating epoxy was added to all voids that exceeded 1/8th
inch.A final sanding just prior to
applying 6 coats of Bristol Finishinsured a beautiful color

July, 2006.One might think that we haven’t done
anything to the varnish since 2003 but this just isn’t the case.The Bristol
finish appears to last a good year, but beyond that you need to do a light
scuffing and add another couple of coats.

One area that does not fair well
at all is the after starboard section of the boat.In July I decided to strip down to bare wood
all the was aft of the primary winches.Once completed this section was primed with penetrating epoxy, then 6
coats of Bristol
was added to the top within 2 hours.We will see how this holds up.There is a slight difference in color between the two areas, but not
enough to get me to strip the entire boat.

Battery:

The battery bank consists of 4 golf cart style batteries
for house power and two deep cycle batteries for engine starting.Total amperage for the house if 740 amps.
Amperage on the starting batteries is 120 cranking each, 85 reserve.

Battery
size is 16.5 X 11.5wX7w”

6/20/03, added water to each house battery.This needs to become a monthly event as the
house was running low very quickly.Each battery took approx 1 liter in each of their 3 cells.We had added water last in December 02.As a result of the continual charging, all
cells were dry, which is not a good sign,

1/22/07,We are now on our second set of
batteries.On June of 2004 we replaced
the entire battery bank, Starting and House, with new Seavolt (West Marine)
batteries.These batteries appeared to
handle our needs fairly well and during the entire 2 years and 7 months we had
the batteries, we only added about 1 quart of water total to each cell.Unfortunately I was not aware of the need to
equalize batteries every 30 days.

Equalization raises the voltage of the batteries to approx
15 volts and in doing so dissolves or displaces any sulfate that has built up
on the battery plates.Without
equalizing, the batteries slowly lose their capacity, though the voltage will
still show as normal.From my
understanding on the use of a hydrometer will allow you to test the difference
between battery voltage and battery capacity.We own one now.

The new battery bank is made by Deka.Deka also makes Seavolt, but I am hoping
with equalization we will get the full 3 years out of the batteries and then
some.

My only issue with the new batteries is that when tested
with hydrometer, 3 of 4 batteries were consistently reading 1270 or
better.Battery
#1 showed 1.250 on the hydrometer which is questionable.I equalized the batteries immediately and
will check the batteries sometime during the next week.

We haven’t added a new section to the log yet, but one of
the additions we plan to make in the next month or two will be solar
panels.The solar panels will allow us
to charge the batteries while we are at anchor and even away from the boat.Additionally with the addition of a MPPT controller
we will also be able to equalize the batteries.

This is only required
because I keep needing information on the dinghy.We have had a recall on the oarlocks recently
and it is driving me crazy that I don’t have the required information for
Zodiac to get them replaced.Don’t
expect many updates to this section but time will tell.

Currently the dinghy is
made by Zodiac and sold through West Marine.Hull
number is WMPX7745J900.Model is RU-260,
sku 257727.

We power the dinghy with a Nissan 3.5, two stroke
outboard.The setup works well but
there is always that nagging feeling that you wished for more horsepower.The lack of horsepower is always a mute point
when we get back to the boat and are able to lift the engine with 1 hand to
place into it’s storage location.

6/23/06We bit the bullet and purchased a 6 HP
Mercury outboard.Initially the engine
appeared to be just what we wanted.When installed the boat powered directly on to plan with me aboard, but
after adding Lisa we were back to plowing through the water, only faster.

We have gotten use the
engine now and accepted that we are close to plan and the added power certainly
lets you push through the waves easily.We are satisfied, but again look to the day when we can buy a bigger
dinghy and get up on a plane.
The driveline is 1.5” stainless, attached to a 3 bladed fixed prop of 22” LH 14.It is supported midway by a SKF POP Release
pillow block which should be greased at regular intervals.Additionally, the driveline is protected by 2
Zincs.A shaft collar is used between
the prop and cutlass bearing, and a shaft nut at the end.

Replaced the rudder zincs (99%).Left the prop zinc as it still had 80%
life.The collars should be replaced
soon

$39.90 each

6/05/06

Zincs

Replaced all zincs (gone) at haul-out.

11/18/06

Zincz

Replaced prop zinc,CPN-F, fell off after Delta trip

$19.00 ea.

The Shaft collar is 1.5 inches and approx 1 inch
thick.You cannot use an egg zinc, as
there is not enough distance between the prop and the cutlass.

The shaft nut size is CPN F.

6/15/03:
Zincs where replaced on the rudder.Each is a plate roughly 4X5.The
shaft zincs were inspected and determined to be 25% gone.I left these on for later inspection at the
end of the summer.

6/27/03:Pillow block completely greased with
AquaShield Grease, formerly called Aqua Lube. The product comes in both 14 oz
cartridges and an 8oz tube. If you are looking for case quantities they can
sell direct to you. The 14oz cartridge is 25 per case and the 8oz tube is 36
per case. If you are looking for less then case quantity the best place to buy
is from a company called R S Hoyt. they are located in Southern
CA. The phone number is 818-703-8488.

5/14/05:We have decided to use the large Divers
Dream zincs for the rudders due to the short life.The new zincs are approx 8 X 14 and ½” thick
(ZHC-10).

The engine onBeyond Reason is a48 horsepower Nissan SD22 marinized
diesel.The assumed hours on the engine
when bought were 1000 hours.After
later inspection it was determined that the hour meter was inoperable so hours
are truly unknown.

The Alternator for
battery powers is a Powermax by Hamilton Ferris Company.It is rated at 125 AMPs.The alternator was rebuilt at hour 11.1 on
the new hour meter installed in Nov 2004.

6/20/03:Zincs on the engine have been replaced.The zincs consist of 1 on the main heat
exchanger and one on the transmission heat exchanger.The zinc sizes are 5/8ths and 3/8ths
respectively.The larger of the zincs
will be milled for the next installation.During the last two installations the zinc had corroded to
the wall of the exchanger and had to be dug out, with much of the zinc falling
into the exchanger.

1/8/05, I have pulled the
alternator.We have had an intermittent
issue with it since the trip south.The
problem is that when viewed from the Link 10 monitor the amperage fluctuates
from 3 to 100 amps.

You can notice the draw
on the engine, as the revs fluctuate as much as 300 RPM’s.The alternator is being rebuilt and should
return around the 1/18/05.

On the 8th I
also noticed that the water pump for the freshwater system appeared to be
leaking.Since the alternator would
normally have to be removed in order to attain access to the water pump, I felt
now would be a good time to get this done as well.

The leak that I noticed
appeared to come from the weep hole.I
was able to order the pump from NAPA
under the guise of a 1980 pickup truck with a Nissan Diesel SD22.I did not have corresponding numbers so was
taking a chance.

When the pump came in
it did not have the correct hub attached.I have pulled the hub from the old and new pumps, but will take the pump
to the shop to have the hubs pressed into place.

The numbers on the old
pump indicate K1662, and an incomplete number that ends in 37504.I will try to ascertain the correct numbers
later.

5/29/05 We had been seeinga lot of steam coming from the exhaust for
the last couple of months.We decided
last week that we would finally have to invest some time in investigating the
issue.I had asked around and all
solutions pointed to the raw water pump.

I have been avoiding the raw water pump for a
while because the bracket and and connection points looked suspect.That is probably the wrong thing to do, but
it was my decision and I just didn’t want to open up any worms that I was not
ready to finish off.

I didn’t take to the
job lightly.The pump is not intuitive
at all.Ultimately what I did was to
disconnect the pump body from the main bracket.The bolts are just short enough to pull free
between pump bracket and the pully.

By freeing up the body,
and then disconnecting the top water hose (actually the pump outlet), you gain
access to the 3 11MM bolts that hold the impellor.Once the bolts are remove you can then drop
the impellor and the impellor case down into the bilge and pull the impellor
out.The body of the pump holds the
shaft and it is loosely dogged into the impellor, so disconnection and
reinsertion is easy.

Reverse the operation
for installation.It helps to put in
the upper body bolt prior to the lower to help align what you can not see.

It took approx 2 hours
of struggle to complete the job.Unfortunately it did not solve the problem.The problem was bottom growth.Once removed the boat breathed freely again.
Beyond Reason is powered with Diesel Fuel.The supply is kept in two tanks under the aft cabins.Capacity is 125 gallons.The tanks are black iron with
cleanouts.There are separate fills for
both tanks located inside the aft bulwarks of the cockpit

The starboard tank is
marked in 10-gallon increments and the stick is located in the generator
compartment.

The port tank dipstick
is located inside the aft port cabin, under the cushions, near the center of
the boat.The dipstick is calibrated in
5-gallon graduations.

Estimated fuel burn
rate (based on trip to Half
Moon Bay
8/30/03) is 1.75
gallons per hour.71 hours of fuel when
filled or 2.97 days of motor.

February 2003:
Of the major projects done on BR, the redesign of the fuel filtration was on of
the priority issues.The original
system consisted of 1 Racor in-line bowl style filter and the standard Nissan
engine mounts filter.

Both filters were paper
element edge type with the addition of a water separator on the Racor.Though
it was not measured, the fuel rate of return back to the main fuel tank was
probably no more than 5 gallons per hour.

Following a fuel
filtration-clogging incident in January, we put plans into place to prevent
future shutdowns of the system.

There was a good
article written in Trawler Magazine several months ago.Much of the design came from this
article.The essentials of the system
are a Walbro 3500 diesel auxiliary fuel pump and one of the many Gulf Coast
filter units.

Gulf Coast
offers fuel filtration to offshore oil rigs and commercial diesel engine
users.The difference in their Deep
filter method vs. the standard Edge type filtration is fuel if pulled though up
to 20 inches of filter mediaDue to the
size restrictions within the Hans Christian, I chose the O1 Jr filter, as
opposed to the F-1.

The O1 uses a standard
toilet paper roll to filter fuel.Fuel
is routed to the top of the roll and sucked through to the bottom.The F-1 uses a Brawny paper towel roll.

With the parts in hand,
the essentials are to cut into the existing fuel supply line and tee in a route
to the O1.It is not suggested to run
both the O1 and the Racor on the same uninterrupted line.The proper sequence should be to use
multiple valves so your fuel can be routed around a clogged or “servicing”
filter without interruption to the fuel supply.

There are ways to use
the auxiliary pump as support system for the live supply of fuel to the engine,
but I chose to only use the pump to filter the system xxxxxxxxxxx

The generator used on Beyond Reason is a modified Faryman
Diesel manufactured by Entec West in Oregon.Entec is located at 16710 South West 72nd Ave, Portland
OR 97224,
phone number (800) 458-5065.The number
is EW-4200-D, serial number 59966/8 or 00966/8.

Maintenance Table

Date

Type

Comments

Estimated Costs

3/10/04

Zincs

10/23/04

Oil

SAE 15w 40WT.There is no filter on the generator.It would help to pull the floor panel beneath the drain to east the
mess.

Oil: $7.99

Oil changes monitored in the engine section

Nov 2002:Upon
testing of the generator for the first time we found it would not start.A quick check by the mechanic indicated that
the fuel shut off solenoid was not operating correctly.The solenoid was checked by opening the
fuel line attached to the injector and turning the engine over.No fuel indicated the valve was shut.

The test for the valve is to pull the banjo nut off the
valve and insert a ferrous metal screwdriver down into the solenoid.When the power switch is turned to the “ON”
position, there should be a magnetic charge holding the screwdriver.No magnetism indicates a broken valve.

May 2003:Generator
has shut down unexpectedly.Following
a call to Entec, it was determined that this was due to overheating.Diagnosis was from the light indicators on
the ignition panel.There are a row of
3 lights on the ignition panel; Temp, Exhaust, oil.The lights are in series.As the all light had extinguished, it was
determined that the temp (first light) was the cause.Had it been an exhaust issue the Temp would
have remained lit and the remaining 2 lights would have been extinguished.

Entec advised that the impellor was the issue, and most
likely the internal water circulation impellor.Both the raw water and internal water
impellor are contained in the same housing, so replacing one virtually
necessitates replacing both.Cost of
repairs was just short of $60 for both, plus 2 days to find the 6m bolts I
broke on extraction.

Following repairs, I thought I would check the internal
water system (water reservoir).As luck
would have it, no water.I hope the
actual problem was one of the seals I replaced, as all the impellor looked
fine.I have saved the old impellors in
a plastic bag filled with WD-40 to prevent splitting.

June 2003:Generator
has shut down unexpectedly again.First
time was due to overloading the system.This blew the main house circuit creating zero power draw/zero power
output.After discovering circuit breaker
issue (1 hour later) restarted the generator.Generator ran for 1 hour then began making a loud tinny slapping
sound.I tried to shut down immediately
but the thing die a slow death (15-20 seconds).Trouble shooting now.

The first check was to ensure that all the lights on the
ignition panel came on.There was a
question regarding whether or not the engine had overheated due to the raw
water intake being plugged.For future
reference, the Entec representative though the noise I had heard could have
been the pump going dry.It was
not.Plenty of water, no overheating.

The second check was to assure that we had fuel at the top
of the cylinder.This was checked by
first shorting out the oil pressure switch allowing the engine to immediately
begin to receive a flooding of oil.You
short the switch by placing a piece of wire between the two screws at the top
of the switch.Next crack the nut open
that feeds the injector.Once this is
complete, use the crank handle to turn the engine over.As the engine comes over you should see a
small squirt of fuel come out of the open nut.Check was completed, plenty of fuel.

Last check was to disconnect the air intake and exhaust
manifolds to listen/see any blow by.Once I pulled the exhaust manifold and turned the engine over it was
evident that the exhaust valve was leaking.I followed up by pulling the head per the instructions from Entec.As is the nature of my luck, when I finally
released the head, both the head and cylinder sleeve came up at the same time
leaving the bare piston and rings swinging in the wind.Up until this time the actual process of
testing and dismantling only took 45 minutes to an hour.Replacing the cylinder sleeve was a 2 hours
job, as I did not have a compression sleeve to help reinsert the piston.

Follow on to completing the valve replacement took 3
phases.1st was the initial
removal, lapping and replacement with a new valve.2nd was the relapping of the
exhaust and lapping of the intake valve.The intake was discovered to be leaking on replacement of the head and
testing for leakage.Had I done a
complete check prior I could have caught this on the first pass.No issue, as neither lapping took, and I
ended up taking the head off a third time and bringing it to Engine Parts &
Machine for a complete resurfacing of the head and grinding of the valves.

In early August the head was completed and as might be
expected things did not go as planned.The head went on without a problem but the engine still would not
start.Robby McKean, a mechanic that
had once fixed the generator was called in.He immediately noticed that the compression was below 350 psi (250psi)
and also confirmed what I had once thought, but without the proper knowledge
dismissed as a bad injector.

Per Robby, he we addressed the injector first, as the
compression, could have been enough to start the engine.For$140.00 the injector was rebuilt.It was determined that water may have entered the injector and blown
half the tip off.As is the Novak luck,
the engine would not start.Next stop
was the compression issue.

When the cylinder was disassembled, the tip of the
injector was found imbedded into the piston.Additionally the middle ring was found fused to the piston on the
backside, nothing $400.00 wouldn’t fix.

With the parts ordered
and the rebuild of the generator well on the way, I had figured we would have
no further issues.This assumption was
only partially true.

On September 13th, Robby came down to do the
final assembly.All the parts went in
as planned and within 2 hours the engine was running.After a final check everything was tightened
up and we re-tested the engine.

Nothing.The
engine would not start.Upon closer
inspection it was noticed that the oil light was not glowing, so we jumped the
terminals and the engine fired up.Cause this time; Oil pressure gauge.

On September 19th, I installed the oil pressure
gauge.As luck would have it, the
terminals were different, so I had to rewire the terminal ends.The engine was now ready to fire up.It did.

I ran the engine with load for 30 minutes.It has a different tone depending on the
load.I engaged the water heater while
the refrigerator was running, just to assure everything worked correctly.

After the 30 minutes, a slight change in engine noise
caused me to go below and check the engine.It seemed pretty warm, but diesels love heat.I turned the engine off, and to my surprise,
that went well.

After doing a once over, I figured I would re-start the
engine and run it one more time.No
dice.All the warning lights were
extinguished.Overheat syndrome.I am now impatiently waiting for the engine
to cool enough to open the water tank.On initial loosening of the tank cap, it appears there is plenty of
water, as it wants to overflow.Hopefully this is the case and I can determine that another “sensor” has
gone bad, and $16.00 more dollars will fix the issue.

The water level appears to be correct; a number of issues
could now be at fault.Water temp gauge,
coolant (using pure water now), exchanger is blocked.All this is fine except the oil pressure is
not correct, and the light will not ignite.

I have just changed the oil and viola; the oil pressure
light looks good.I quickly shut down
the engine and clean up.After cleanup I
try the engine again, nothing.Oil
light will not come on.I will now buy a
manual gauge, and check the pressure before proceeding.I assume it will be either the pump or
perhaps the oil filter screen now.

Did I say this was frustrating?

Installed the manual Oil gauge yesterday 8/27, here are
the readings I found

First start: 25 psi

After initial start (30 – 60 seconds time) 12 – 15 psi and
building

After first minute 30-35 psi

On restart, after 10 minute run 35-40 psi.

September
28 2003,this morning I pulled the freshwater line for the water
pump.There is an incredible amount of
sediment in the line.I flush the
system three times and it is running clear again.

Restart so far is good after 10 minutes.I will shut down, and retest.System is green on retest.All lights are good.I have adjusted the oil switch (didn’t know
it was adjustable) to turn on with little pressure.Next step is to adjust it so the light will
not come on at start, then adjust so light will just begin to come on.This is kind of like tuning by ear.

I have adjusted the oil sensor screw to show 3 and 9 o’clock.All is functioning.I am afraid to do the ½ hour test.

Restarted at 1005 A.M. 28 September 2003.OK, the ½ hour test has been passed.Engine restarted and appears to run
correctly.Next stop is the weekend
test.TBC.

10/18/2003,
Engine has now passed the 45-minute test while at China Camp.Shut down was clean and the lights are ready
to restart.

The Head on Beyond Reason is a Groco Type K.This differs from the original sales spec
sheet, which listed the Wilcox-Crittenden type 7.On August 6th 2004, we noticed that the inlet
valve was leaking and quickly made the necessary repair to stem the flow.

I had originally thought that we had repair kits on board,
but from the paragraph above you can see that the improper kits were
available.Luckily I was able to just
adjust the flapper valve and stem the flow.I will have to buy a new kit for future disasters.

The head on BR can be pumped overboard or onboard via a Y
valve located under the forward V-berth.From recent use, it appears the holding tank may either have a leak in
the upper portion or is not vented overboard.

appeared to be safe and reasonably sized for vessel I was
not convinced that it’s operation was sound or reliable.We had worked with the heater for
approximately 6 months, but there always seemed to be an issue with fuel
overflow due to inconsistent burn rate.

We switched heaters to a
new Dickinson Newport diesel fired stove. Installation required removal of the
old unit and a new build of the under lament with follow-up installation of new
tile and wood trimming.We sourced our
tile locally selecting Spanish porcelain tiles in an attractive marble look.

Installation was relatively straightforward.Mount to the wall, extend the flue and
reconnect the diesel line.Of course it
is not always as easy as the instructions detail.In our case the flue needed to be completely
replaced due to the elbows being frozen, the wall mounts needed to be
completely re-formed as we could not mount the heater directly to the bulkhead
due to the compression post being in the way, and the diesel line needed to be
replaced with a larger 3/8th inch line, as well as replacement of
the fuel pump.

The new heater has
several safety features that give some comfort.First is the draft assist fan.The assist fan prevents or at least assists
the fire in maintaining positive pressure in the flue helping to eliminate down
drafts while under sail.

The Second safety is the
fuel control itself.The control has
twopartsto it.First is an overflow for the metering of fuel.If the heater-metering valve is blocked or
there is excess pressure in the line caused by the fuel pump malfunctioning,
the valve will overflow into a separate container via a second line.The other portion of the valve is an overheat
sensor.

In essence the
overheat protection is just a waxed spring that will shut the fuel valve off if
the valve exceeds 120 degrees.

The finished heater offers heat as well as the ambiance
that was paramount for the Queen of the ship to be happy.

Ah, the life raft.That piece of equipment that is meant to save ones life during the most
dramatic of times.A simple piece of
machinery, which should deploy easily in the roughest of conditions to save the
family which fate has been so cruel to.

We have had the boat for
just over 1 year and it became evident that with the pending “cruise” coming up
to the Channel Islands in Southern California,
we should look at repacking and recertifying the life raft.The deploying of the raft had never really
occurred to me, so I went into this blindly and without expectations.

For what it is worth I will suggest to the group at HCOA
(Hans Christian of America)
that everyone should at least practice the deployment of their life raft. As stated I went in blindly.I actually expected to be able to pull a
quick release pin, lift the raft up and toss it off the boat (and into a
waiting wagon) with little effort.

The first part of the scenario was correct.I pulled the quick release pin and easily
separated the hold down webbing from the main traveler of the boat.This was the last piece of the play that I
would get correct.Upon releasing the
pin, I realized that the pin only held the webbing to the traveler.The purpose of this I am not sure, but
appears someone was unsure of the actual strength of the cradle that had been
build and secured to the coach roof for the sole purpose of holding the raft.

Thinking I had released the raft I gave a presumptuous tug
on the raft and realized it was still attached.On inspection I found that the actual hold
down was knotted together and proceeded to undue the entanglement.On a watch I assume the whole process took
about two minutes to deconstruct.Alas
the raft was free and I could pull it off the roof.Not so easy.

During my pre-thoughts (the thoughts that usually plan the
time line for replacing a stainless strap on a water basin pipe in less than 5
minutes, but which actually takes most of the afternoon due to the unforeseen
bulkhead) I figured the raft weighed in at approx 35 – 50 lbs.When I went to dislodge the raft from it’s
cradle I found that the weight was in excess of 50 and much closed to 100
lbs.I am not small and found it a
struggle to move the raft off the cradle while standing with one foot on the
roof and the other on the deck.I can
imagine that during a pitching storm or while impaled ona coral reef in the middle of the Indian ocean that this process would be much more
difficult, with or without adrenalin.

Once I had pulled the raft from the cradle and began to
rotate towards the lifeline, I found the next hurdle that was unforeseen at the
beginning, the tether.It is possible
that the tether, if pulled on may be longer than the 3 feet I had attached, but
I did not want to test the theory.

The tether in it’s present state gave me almost enough
slack to make my turn to the life lines, almost.So back in the cradle the raft went for one
last rally.Understanding the need to
have the raft connected to boat during a storm, I was able to overcome the urge
to cuss when I saw the knot that attached the life pod once again to the main
traveler (God help us if the traveler should ever part).The issue I had was why was the knot
something that may have been disconnected quickly if I wasn’t carrying a
machete during the epoch storm that would be required for me to muster the gut
wrenching effort required to launch the vehicle.

The conclusion I came too once the raft was securely
placed in the wagon was that had a sinking occurred we both would have
drown.Not quickly or easily, but only
after the gunnels were underwater and I was still struggling under a fully
inflated life raft which had just broken both my ankles after the intact
canister was pulled from my grips just short of the life lines then
deployed.

I took the raft to Sals Inflatable in Alameda, CA
for inspection (510-522-1824).When I
dropped the raft off, I thought it would be cool to see the actual deployment
(with the above scenario it would have been the last thing I saw before
drowning).Sal was very gracious and
actually suggested we do it 5 days later when Lisa could attend.

We arrived at the appointed time, and were led to the back
of the warehouse where a carpet was laid out and we began to go over the lift
raft canister.At first I was
disappointed when Sal cut the metal strapping which keeps the canister closed
during non-use.I would soon begin to
appreciate his efforts, as the explosive deployment of the life raft was not to
be, and an education beyond anything we had expected was about to begin.

We began by cutting the metal straps on the canister
(these were noted as not being within the Avon
specs, but certainly adequate for the job.Next we removed the shrink tape that was along the edges of the two
halves of the unit.Sal made mention
that the tape was not necessary, but it did add another protective element to
the preservation of the raft.We would
later appreciate these measures.

I didn’t mention that the raft was last certified in 1996,
almost 10 years before.Prior to the
inspection I had not thought about the condition of the raft, but during the
inspection all I could think of was had it dry rotten in the container or not.

With the tape and the strapping removed we opened the
cover of the unit to see the hermetically sealed raft (the raft was vacuum
bagged at the last inspection). The bagging again was an extra preservation
effort that Sal said was not necessary but certainly would add to the longevity
of raft.

At this point we were instructed to pull the ripcord and
see what would happen.

Lisa took a tug and realized that the inflation process
was not going to happen on accident.Just pulling the first half of the cord that incorporated a rubber plug
filling the cord hole on the container required effort.Actually it required a lot of effort, and
until we stopped the raft from sliding around the floor, the plug wouldn’t come
free.

We didn’t actually inflate the raft with the pull; it only
dislodged the plug and allowed another 20’ of cord to be pulled out of the
raft.I should justify the 20’ of cord
did not come out easily as there was a problem with the initial packaging and
cord was actually wrapped around the raft.This was the first major problem we found with the raft.

I gave the line a tug as
well but the only way the cord was going to come out was if the vacuum bag was
torn open and the line freed or the rip cord/actuation pin was pulled.

After this discovery we took the raft out of the container
and continued the inspection of the actuation pin and cylinder.The cylinder is certified for 5 years and is
filled with a combination of CO2 and Nitrogen.The certification was due in 1999.

The potential cost of a new cylinder is $800.00, so prior
to any testing of the raft, it is suggested to have the cylinder tested.

The firing pin on the
cylinder was a surprise.It is a
mechanically leveraged mechanism that forces the pin into the cylinder rather
than a spring actuated mechanism.The
pin itself looks much the same as the end of a Phillips screwdriver as opposed
to a nail or needle.No chance of the
pin ever getting broken.

With the cylinder removed and the pin looking quite
dapper, we moved to inflate the raft via an electric pump.This did not provide the “explosion” we had
originally hoped for, but it did stress the raft much less.

Once the raft was inflated we noticed that the “flipping
strap” had been ripped.Remember this
raft was inspected in 1998 supposedly.The flipping strap is used to right the raft when it deploys.The raft did hold air and the
relief/equalizing valves all operated as expected.

We were all invited to get into the raft at this
point.With 3 people a 6-man raft it
became apparent that survival was the operative word in Survival Raft.We were very cramped and Lisa told me later
in the day she was about to exit the raft due to claustrophobia.She contained herself and was able to
handle the rest of the instruction.

Several things became
apparent during our demonstration.Number one, the fishing kit was made for trout.We have bought appropriate gear to
supplement this kit.Number 2, the pump
supplied with the kit will certainly heat you up should you be cold when
entering the raft.The rubber air pump
was in good condition but 30 seconds of pumping is enough for even the
strongest in the crew.

The most alarming item we found wrong was the throw
ring.The throw ring is used to either
toss or swim out to a companion who cannot reach the raft.In the event of a disabled person, you would
place the ring around your arm and leave the raft in route to your
companion.Theoretically the ring is
attached to the raft with rope, nope.

Had an actual emergency happened, and someone had not
noticed the line was disconnect, we could have easily ended up with 2 or more
people in the water and none in a raft which could have blown away,
frightening.

All in all the entire raft looks good, and I don’t see any
reason for it to not pass inspection.

May 15,
2004.

Picked up the newly certified life raft ($1400).Lots of gear has been replaced though there
were not surprised.Flares, food, water
and some of the medications all had expired.The light at the top of the raft was replaced as well as the strap on
the bottom of the raft.We had 2
immersion suits added for hypothermia protection should that be needed.Additionally we upgraded the fishing gear
and added a multi-tool knife to the equipment.

We had inventoried the ditch kits and added additional equipment
to these as well.The added equipment
is Space Blankets, 16 AA batteries, compass and rescue kites.

Next years certification will be much cheaper as we will
not have to replace flairs etc.

Superior Valve Co, in Washington PA, 15301 makes the forged brass Tuffy
packless line valves for the system.Part number is 214-4, ¼” SAE

The temperature control is a Penn manufactured by
Johnson Controls, part number is A19ABC-24C.The Sporlan thermostatic expansion valve part # is BF F A
ZP.Inlet is 3/8” and d outlet is ½”
flare.Sporlan also manufactures the
Catchall filter drier, type C-162, ¼” SAE flare with 16 cubic inch desiccant.

The water pump is made by March LC-2C.1/35 HP 1.2 amp, 67 watts (with inline 1 amp
fuse in electrical box, and a ¾ ton cooled condenser

02/21/05,Had JR Anderson come out to the boat today to
check the refrigeration system.We had
big plans to modify the system prior to Mr Andersons visit.After discussion of the current unit and Mr
Andersons approval of all that we had on the boat, it turns out he may have
done the initial installation years ago.

Mr. Anderson said we may have been a little light on
Freon, so we added approx 16 oz’s of Freon and the system was pronounced sound
and worthy of the boats status.The
March pump, which is used to cool the expansion valve during warm weather, but
that has yet to be completely installed,was detected, an it was advised to complete installation prior to
venturing into warmer climates.

It was also suggested that we move the thermostat to an
area not so near the engine. We are now waiting on the bill.With any luck this checkup has saved us over
9K (estimate from Glacier Bay today for new
box and system).

12/05/06We have recalled Anderson refrigeration to detect a slow leak
in the closed system.After 2 hours
they were able to locate the leak and replace the Freon with 2 bottles.

The safety equipment aboard requires periodic
inspection.In certain instances I
have given over complete chapters to some safety items, but needed a place to
store vital registration data and inspection due dates.This section outlines those registration
update and inspection dates.

Between February 17th
and February 24th we installed our long awaited “Solar Grid”.The grid consists of 3 Kyocera KC65 12 volt
panels.Each of the panels are capable
of producing up to 21.7 volts of open circuit power, or 17.4 volts with a load.The max amperage of each panel is 3.75 amps
giving us a total capacity of 11.25 amps if everything is perfect.

To enable the
perfection of the system we added to piece of equipment to control the voltage
and maximize our output.

The first piece of
equipment is a solar booster from Blue Sky Energy.The Solar Boost 2512i(X) is capable of
maximizing the solar power we receive from the panels.In a nutshell batteries can only receive
input voltage of approximately 1 volt higher than the batteries current
state.As an example, if your battery
is nearly discharged at 11.75 volts and the input from the solar panels is 13
volts, you waste .25 volts in the process of charging.The
Solar Boost drops the voltage to an acceptance rate and turns the extra voltage
into amps which is a good savings in the energy department.The conversion is 95% efficient

The
second piece of equipment is the IPN-ProRemote.The ProRemote is purely a convenience items
that allows you to see exactly what the panels and batteries are doing.It also allows the owner to equalize the
batteries using the solar panels.If
there is not enough energy the first day to properly equalize the batteries the
remote will continue the process the next day until a full equalization is
completed.

We are happy with our
CNG stove.It is the happy medium
between our old diesel stove and a propane stove.For years I have heard evil stories about
propane, but the antagonists of the use have slowly faded to the background as
Alcohol and diesels have fallen out of favor on the side of ease of use and
electrical sensing devices.

Ours is a Hillerange, made by Seaward Products in El Monte California.The Model is 3131, SN# 13685.

During the last days of October 2005, we ran into our
first issue with the stove while trying to make bread.The thermostat suddenly stopped controlling
the temperature and so no bread was served over the weekend.

With a little research I was able to find a parts supplier
still in existence in South California. Happily
parts are still available from Gas Systems located in Rancho Dominguez,
CA.2970 E. Maria St.Tel (800) 323-8924, Fax (310) 603 - 0165.

Beyond Reason has a bow thruster made by Vetus.The thruster is a single bladed electric powered
contraption.The electrical draw is
immense and the power is proper for calm waters without much wind.

Date

Type

Comments

Estimated Costs

6/03/04

Zincs

Thruster CMT 20 teardrop,

10/30/04

Zincs

Replaced, screw on thruster is metric or something
other that ¼ 20.Will figure later.

$3.00

We had the thruster
rebuilt just prior to our trip south as the connections had burnt through and
it no longer worked.

Disassemble is straight forward, with 4 socket head bolts
holding the motor in place and a bayonet style connection used to connect the
motor to the transmission

We had the motor rebuilt by Diablo Marine and new brushes
were added at that time.

Reassembly was simple
with just the 4 bolts.We also located
the lubrication cylinder, which is in the bathroom just above the inside of the
cabinet.You can see the lubrication
tube leading into the base of the thruster in the picture to the right.

The water maker on Beyond Reason is a PUR, Power survivor 35.Katidyn has replaced this model after
purchasing the line from PUR.The specs
on this model are for shown as a power consumption rate of 4 amps (12 Volt)
developing 1.4 gallons per hour.

My first test of the water make worked very well.The prefilter looked clean so I turned the
key and the pump began its cyclic movements.After a short while the water began to trickle into the sink.

The shocking part of the process is how slowly 1.4 gallons
of water comes out of the sink.I
checked the rate and it appeared just at the minimum of 1.05 liters per every
15 minutes.The preferred is 1.25
liters but I have justified the loss to what happened next.

After letting the maker run for approx 1 hour I shut it
down and proceeded to re-pickle the unit.Per the instructions I let all the water pump from the membrane, mixed
the solution of biocide and attached the auxiliary pickup to the intake
tube.Nothing.I was getting no suction now, so I had to
being an investigation.

I always find it strange how things will work once for me,
but then require immediate repair.I
think this may have been why the Rusts sold the boat.Anyway, I quickly determined it was the unit
and not any of the plumbing that wasn’t developing a draw.

A quick glance at the instruction manual brought me to
understanding that one of the 6 O-rings could have developed a leak.5 screws later I had the unit apart, new
O-rings installed and the unit sucking like a, well, you know what I might say,
but at any rate it was functioning.

After replacing the tubing and re-installing the auxiliary
pickup the unit quickly drank up the solution and was pickled.

I can’t wait to re-try the unit again now, but it will be
after the big trip in July.

The Water heater on Beyond Reason is made by ABI.It is a 6-gallon, 110-volt heater with a
1500-watt element.Until January 2004
the heater appeared to be working very well.In early January I discovered that the heater was taking more than 2
hours to heat water.

I suspect the element is at fault and will soon delve into
the repair of the water heater.I have
heard the elements are easy to replace and they are definitely inexpensive.

Upon inspection it was the heater element that needed to
be replaced.The front cover of the
water heater is easily removed showing the element with it’s ¾” face.After unscrewing this the element is pulled
from the heater.

The replacement element appeared to be much better as
there is additional area on this one that the original did nothave.By this I mean the original was shaped like a standard loop.The new element is a loop, which has been
doubled over.It had to be worked into
the hole, and so on removal of this one, I would expect some cajoling to be
necessary to remove it.

The rigging diameters are given in inches and approximate
fractional size.I took these
measurements on February 28th
2004.At this time all
rigging appears to be in good shape and had received an inspection the previous
year when the spars were re-painted and the masts re-stepped.

Need to reset or replace hour meter.We have log a minimum of hours 10 –30 hours
since purchase and the hour meter is showing 2-3 hours usage.

Additional observation. Is the engine and surface rust
increasing?It appears that the outside
surface rust has increased since we bought the boat.I am concerned that the harbor may be hot
and we have already (6 months) gone through our zincs.I will check later this week and document
all zincs.Current Zinc list includes,

2 – Heat exchanger

2 – Rudder pintle

1-prop nut

Prop shaft

I will update the sizes in the next installment.There is also 1 zinc on the Entec generator.

Engine
ran great throughout the trip.Average
Temp 158.No trouble noted.

Trip:Departed Oakland approx 0800.As crew were Lisa and John.No wind so a full motor out to Sausalito to watch the
IACC boats race one of a series of races.Arrived as scheduled at 0930.It
was fun to see the boats that had raced previous A-cups.Following the end of the first race, 1130,
we departed to set reefs in the main, which had yet to be completed from the
mast job.

Reef lines where quickly fixed though I still question how
the originals were ran.Will continue
to check to see if they need to be adjusted.

Arrived back at Alameda,
CA approx 1400.Dropped John off and then departed again
for Treasure Island.Dropped hook at TI in 16 feet of water with
80’ of chain.We were not going anywhere.Spent a pleasant night talking and eating
with Lisa.

Awoke the next morning.Much of the power was drained, so we started the Generator.Gen ran for approx 1 hour with no
issues.Brought the power up
significantly, so electrical appliances could be used.Stood by anchor till 1400 the next day
before departing for Oakland,
enroute to pickup Stephanie.

Mechanical
condition: No issues other than the Generator not working.70 gals of fuel (full port tank).

Trip:I am writing
this after the trip.Lisa and I had a
wonderful time.We departed by 7:30 AM giving us time to run to the Golden Gate Bridge by 10:10 am (the end of slack tide).We arrived just in time for the slack tide
to be changing to flood.
This is the appropriate time if you have plenty of wind.Unfortunately we did not and ended up trying
to sail against the tide for an hour or two.We arrived at buoy #2 (first buoy outside of gate) approx 1300.

Had we left earlier, we would haveshaved 2 hours or more off our time to the
first buoy.Most of the fleet was ahead
of us by this time, and they all kept the shoreline course.In previous trips we had taken the shoreline
route, but the conditions can change quickly over the southern shoals and on
the return trip, many of those who chose to come back via this route had much
rougher conditions.We chose to take the
outside route before heading south (2 miles) off the Point Montera buoy.

The wind headed us the entire trip, so it was slow motor
and slow sail all the way in.Lisa
located the amidships berth and appeared to enjoy a nice nap during most of the
trip south to Half Moon Bay.Arrival
time was approx 1700.

We confirmed each of our waypoints on the way down to
assure us a safe passage back even though we anticipated fog in the early
hours.

The yacht club was refreshing.More of an upscale Palapa than a Yacht
Club.Cement floor, places to wash sand
off of yourself, directly on the beach, and an enormous fire pit, all made the
club, the best we have been too yet.

We visited the club on Saturday evening after being
shrugged off by our own club who had anchored (poorly) in the enclosed
bay.We chose to hang out in front of
the pot-bellied stove inside the protection of the huge Sun Room.The weather was warm, so there was really no
need stay inside, but another club was outside enjoying oysters and charred beef
from their Hibachi’s.

Following a drink and some time to relax, we moved down
the main strip to the Fish Trap.The
Fish Trap is an over priced fish and chips restaurant.I am not complaining, the ambience was funky
and just what we had expected.The
Foster’s were on sale and I really didn’t mind spending $14 for fried
fish.

We had fun eating and ease dropping on the large couple
beside us.It is always fun to listen
to other people problems as it makes our issues seem that much smaller.Apparently the husband and wife were not getting
along together.Something about a
shopping trip that the husband did not want to go to.

On Sunday we mulled about in the dingy, narrowly missing
getting flipped in the surf along the beach.The weather was warm (70 – 80 degrees), calm and completely
enjoyable.Around noon, we met with our club and brought
margaritas in a thermos, which was a big hit.Apparently there are not many people who have blenders on their
boat.

In the evening, we moved over to the Half Moon Bay Yacht
Club for the grand fire.I can’t say
the time was extremely exciting, but I fully enjoyed the fire for what is was
for nearly 2 hours.Wonderful

Departure on Monday morning was interesting and typical
for Half Moon Bay.We tried to sneak
out early, only to find that the GPS points I was looking at had not been
reversed.We used the radar to come
back into the harbor, reset the marks and made our departure.

The trickiest part of the trip out of Half Moon Bay is the
channel.The first marker showed up
well on the radar and we saw the mark at approximately 200 yards out.From there acourse is set for the outer buoy.The channel should be approx 40 feet deep at the shallowest and
continually get deeper from there.

At one point we saw 27 feet and began emergency procedures
turning south for deeper water.Apparently I had been favoring the North side of the channel, and nearly
put us on the reef.The turn to south
was the right decision and we immediately saw deeper water.

The trip back to the bridge was done purely by Radar and
GPS.Visibility was less than ¼ mile
the whole way back to the bridge and beyond.The boat worked flawlessly and Lisa did not feel sick at all.She has since concluded that the amidships
berth is perfect for future travel at sea.

One the final run to home (Golden
Gate to the estuary) we saw nice winds and it was great to shut
down the engine.I suspect we
motored15 – 20 hours. This gives us a
burn rate of approx 1.75 gallons per hour.

Arrived yesterday after a nice trip across the bay in
light winds.I had topped off the
batteries with approx 5 quarts of water the night before so we had plenty of
power.We met the OYC later in the
evening following a beach side picnic with Lisa and Sparky.

We met another couple
from the club at the beach, Rick Scaife and Viera plus their dog Neopolean
Bonaparte or Bony.Rick is not a small
man and I would guess he was in the mid to high 200’s, while his dog was a 70
lbs Basset hound.Together with Rick's
girlfriend they made quite a site in the 5-foot inflatable department store
dingy.

We were amused watching them, but to Rick’s credit they
and the plastic oars of the dingy safely transited the ¼ mile to their boat.

This morning we woke up with the usual Sunday Humor.I was a bit hung over from the night before,
but Lisa sympathized with me and made breakfast.I am not sure if Lisa has ever made
breakfast before.She is normally a
great cook, and has put together some fantastic meals, but only Lisa could cut
her finger on eggshells.I was in the
cockpit when the bizarre accident happened.She spent the next ten minutes trying to extract the impailment then
proceeded to continue trying to open the eggs.Another 10 minutes later and I was doing the chore myself.

When spent the afternoon in the dingy going up to Goleta creek.We should have brought more fuel and money,
as there is a quaintly rundown bar just inside the mouth of the creek.

Once back to the boat, Lisa put together a great lunch and
then we made our departure for home.McNears beach and China
camp are still one of our favorite anchorages in the bay.

US COAST GUARD BOARDING!The CGC Sockeye has hailed us and they are sending a boarding party to
inspect Beyond Reason.SR3 Matt Turner
climbed aboard and proceeded to check our boat for compliance.

Valid documentation was asked for and proof of indelible
marking on the hull to confirm.I also
had to produce the Waste Management Plan for the vessel.Luckily I had the plan and was able to
produce without issue.

We were given grace on the discharge of the head.We had been open to the sea, but being in
enclosed waters could have produced a large fine.Life Jackets were checked and confirmed as
within tolerance.OurOil Discharge signs were also passed with
colors.

In all the boarding went well and SR3 Matt Turner was
pleasant and complimentary with regards to the boat.He circled number 133 on his Boarding Report
(No violations).

Lisa and I continued our voyage to the East side of the
island and anchored in 20 feet of water.I deployed a snubber through the anchor rollers and then launched the
dingy.

Sparky was very happy to go to the beach for exercise and
adventure.Of the treasures we located
while at the beach, 4 tennis balls, 1 tennis throw toy,1 duck decoy and a
hypodermic needle where found.We left
the needle, but took the remainder of the stash.

Following our exercise on the beach, we decided to go for
a long dingy ride around the island.Lots of little beaches to explore along the island and we will have to
take the time to check them all later.

Because it was overcast, we did not dwell on any of the
other beaches, but simply putted around the shore.The nice thing about the overcast is that it
brings out many of the animals that would otherwise be hidden.We counted 7 seals, hundreds (literally) of
Cormorants and several people.

When we returned we opened a can of soup that had been on
our previous boat, and warmed it for lunch.It is amazing how certain foods seem like a good idea, but when it
really comes to cooking them you really want to save them for that special
time, so they stay unopened for years.This was one of those cans.Eat
by date was September 2002, oh well we are only a day or 500 past that.

I have heard of military sea rations being good for years
and years, hopefully this can of soup is similar to those old sea rats.

We are expecting low tide around 7 pm tonight.I am confident we have plenty of water under us, but it will be a minus
1 tide, so will have to watch.

We are now showing10 feet and all is OK.Several
things have occurred during the last several hours.As is it now 1955 this is being written in
past tense.

Some time after 5 pm we noticed a sailboatthat was approx ½ mile to our east.I watched it closely as there was something
strange about it being out as far as it was, and yet it had no sails up
andappeared to be drifting out to
sea.After approx 15 minutes I noticed
that is was drifting even further out to sea yet it was facing into the
tide.I decided the boat needed to be
rescued so I grabbed the handheld VHF and jumped into the dingy.I had Lisa monitor my channel just in case I
was shot while trying to rescue afoundering boat.When I arrived
at boat, it turned out to be a couple of hippies that where smoking hooch and
fishing for flounders or something.

The guy was
appreciative that someone was watching out for other humans.I gallantly sped home and told Lisa about
the escapade.After relaxing a bit, we
decided it was time to BBq so we took out some of the old sausages we had and
burned them well to assure no poisons were contained.

As it reaches 8pm, I have to say this is a glorious
night.Lisa is down stairs sleeping or
napping after dinner.The inside
temperature last time I checked was almost 80.I am outside enjoying an almost perfect San Francisco Bay
night.The lights of the city are
shinning on a very crisp, yet not so cool night.

I would say the
temperature is hovering around 60 degrees F.The stars are clearly out and the lights of the city are reflecting in
the calm waters of the bay.There are
some scattered clouds, though within the entire sky I can only see 2 distinct
cloud forms to the east.

I have had some old
growth wine by Topolo that was very good and distinctive, coupled with a Padron
cigar and life is rich.

The tide is now
increasing so I imagine I can safely go to bed.The seals on the beach are driving the dog
nuts, but that is good for him.I
expect peaceful sleep by all tonight.

At this time I can
safely say the weekend is relaxing and worth every amount of effort I have put
into it.The effort has not really
amounted to much as I was too lazy to go to the super market on Friday
night.Surprisingly we are not perishing
nor even having to tough it out.

Mechanical
condition: Everything functioning.Just replaced the zincs on the prop, rudder shaft, drive shaft and bow
thruster.The zincs are fading faster
than I thought.I have replaced the
starter battery as well.

The starter battery has been bad for over a year now, so
with any luck this will help with the loss of zinc.

Trip:We have
guests for the first time in some time.Blake Cooke, his wife Sharon and two swabbiesThomas and James are aboard.James is quite the aspiring Marine Biologist
and takes to the boat quickly.Both
boys are in the 10-year range.

We pulled out around 11:00
and planned to proceeded in a clockwise fashion around the city front through
Raccoon straights behind Angel
Island and back.The morning was gorgeous as we motored up
the estuary.The wind was light and the
day looked like it would be completely laid back with only a small breeze.

When we exited the estuary the wind picked up to approx 8
knots and we were able to make way(outgoing tide) under sail.We
actually were doing quite well against another Ketch of similar size.

As we past under the San Francisco side of the Bay Bridge
the wind began to fill in nicely and we had a nice heal while making 6 knots in
10 – 15 knots of breeze.These
conditions lasted till we past Alcatraz
Island.

Just after passing Alcatraz
the wind increase to 20 – 25 knots.As
we had only another mile or so, I left the canvass full and proceeded on
course.It was only then that we
noticed a tanker taking up our reciprocal course.Not toworry, we tacked to starboard and slowly made way towards the Golden Gate.We
could have eased sheets and headed back down the city front but we figured the
tanker would soon pass and we could continue.

After nearly 15 minutes of waiting we were able tore-establish our course and head into Raccoon
Straights.It is at this point we reefed
down.We should have done so 15 minutes
previously, but with the tanker and the tacking we didn’t notice the wind had
increase to 25 plus.

Once reefed the boat settled down and we all enjoyed the
trip though the straights.Lunch was
served up shortly afterwards on the backside of Angel Island.

I must remember when taking out crew for the first time
that reefing early is Good.The members
of the crew all seemed to take the over canvassing in stride, but the anxiety
level was definitely increase.

The trip home would really prove the metal of this new
crew and I set the reefs early.Actually
I left the main down as the trip would be a full reach and run.I expected some heavy air so the mizzen was
left full and the jib was trimmed down to just a 90.

As we hoisted anchor and began to peak around the edges of
the island, the young lads became over comfortable with the situation and had
to be rained in.The wind increased
from 25 to 30 then steady at 35 knots as we pulled into the slot.

Trip: Departed for the K-FOG Kaboom, San Francisco.Had a chance to test the new reefing system
on the Mizzen.All the equipment
worked and in 27 knot of wind and reefed jib the boat had neutral helm and
could easily attain any point.

Guest today included, Marv Clark and Kelly and Corbet
Parker.When we arrived in SF we
anchored near pier 40.With the
barbeque started we began to grill dinner for everyone.It is a pity that the rules of the game
can’t be published early, but the police came by and requested we move south of
pier 38. This sounds easy enough but in actuality it required a move of more
than ¼ mile due to the congestion.

Once anchored for the second time, everything went well
for the remainder of the night.We
anchored in 68 feet of water letting out just 180 feet of chain, again due to
congestion.

The trip home was very speedy.With just the full Jib pulling we moved
along with the tide at close to 6 knots.It was an anxious moment coming in to the marina, with 10-15 knots of
wind and a near maximum flood tide in the same direction.

We eased into position at a near drift and turned to port
for the line up.I made the line up
early this time, and dropped the transmission into reverse at about 1000
rpms.As expected the bow began to drift
down with the current.We countered
with the bow thruster, but it is underpowered so just slowed the
inevitable.With the rudder hard to
port, a juiced the boat into forward and raised the Rpms to about 1500 for just
a second or two to twist the stern to starboard.

With the bow thruster still engaged, we shifted to reverse
again and began to back down straight once more.Since we had started the process early, we
had plenty of time for adjustment.Following three of the forward/reverse actions and leaving the rudder to
port nearly the whole time, we pulled directly into the berth without a touch.

Perfect docking!!

After saying goodbye to our guests, we did a quick cleanup
and then off to bed.Today was a good
day.

Trip:We are
prepping for the trip to Benicia
today.This is the beginning of the
Memorial Day Holiday and today is Friday.I have just completed the removal and installation of the house battery
bank.We are now showing 740 good amps
with a full charge.The starting
battery is near new with additional 120 amps.

I tested the generator as well this week and was please
with the sound and function for 30 minutes.

On board will be Lisa and the pup, Sparky.Current conditions in the harbor are 19
knots steady with gusts to 22.Will
monitor for an hour or two before making a decision to move to Treasure Island or wait for a 0600 morning
departure.

Slack tide is 0647 tomorrow, with a Max flood at
0900.Weather conditions for the
weekend are Sat/Sun clear, wind 10 – 20 MPH.

Have set up waypoints for this trip from Alameda
to Benicia

DATE: 29, May 2004,

We have arrived at Treasure Island
and have made anchor in 16 ft of water.The anchor is holding well and the wind has moderated to 4-7 knots.The batteries are working well though there
were some anxious moments during our initial departure due to the inverter
cycling.Not sure why.

The bow thruster is not functioning at this time, but I am
assuming it is the solenoids as this has caused trouble in the past.

We should be underway between 5 and 6 AM tomorrow to catch the last portion of the
tide into Benicia.

Departed Treasure Island
this AM approximately 0600.After
dropping 100 feet of chain in 16 ft of water last night I was not in a good
mood.We definitely stuck to the
bottom.Problem being that the bottom
is a sticky gooey mess and all that chain required cleaning before dropping
back into the boat.

Once the cleaning was completed, we were underway and the
fresh coffee tasted good as we caught the last of the ebb tide prior to Angel Island
and eventually caught the incoming flood tide up to Benicia.

By all accounts it looked like this would be
another motorboat trip as the wind was light and on the nose.Once around Pinole point though it turned
and began running with us.We stopped
the engine and pulled up the main, mizzen and jib and began the sailing into Benicia at 2.5 knots.Time was not important today so we casually
moseyed along and enjoyed the warm weather.

By noon we had reached the Carquinez Bridge
and were had switched to spinnaker and mizzen.We had been trolling a lure for sometime and just about the time the
spinnaker began to wrap around the head stay, we caught a fish.

Mind you it was not a keeper but a fish it was.The rest of the trip into Benicia was a breeze and we pulled in an tied
up next to American Odyssey, a beautiful Grand Banks 45(wl) with out event.

Dinner was at 1800 and consisted of Ahi Tuna, Chicken and
pork along with some other stuff.

There is concern over the batteries already.The fridge has been running most of the day,
but the batteries were at full charge early in the day and are now showing
yellow lights which is 50% charged.That’s a lot of battery in one day.Will have to monitor closer and run the generator more (yuk).

Well, needless to say, we have had a slow end to the
summer.Have made several trips to the
bay over the August and September time frame.September 11-12 being the most notable up to this weekend.

On the 11th we put out to Angel Island
for the weekend.We were lucky to find
that the Alameda Yacht club was having a get together so were able to enjoy
some of their social hour on Saturday.

We met the owners of
Tensegrity, a sister ship to BR.Keith and his lady friend (whose name
escapes me as I write) have some knowledge of BR’s past owner
Robert/Restless.It was very interesting
to hear the dedication that was put into the boat by Robert during his
preparations for Hawaii.Per Keith he tells me the quality of the
epoxy bottom and all electrical wiring was top notch.

This past weekend we spent approximately 8 hours taking my
mom and her friend Ann out for a cruise on the bay.We had glorious weather, 15 knots of breeze
and highs in the 70’s.We spent some
time reaching from Treasure Island to Angel
Island, then spent an hour having
lunch hove-to behind Angel
Island.

Lunch was complete with Cordon Blu chicken, spring salad
with honey glazed walnuts and Gorgonzola cheese, tortellini and ice cream for
desert.Following lunch we were back out
to the main bay enjoying what was left of fleet week complete with the
Snowbirds from Canada.

A sad discovery today, we have lost part of the log due
to some computer glitch.I will try
recovery tomorrow, but it looks like everything from July 31, 2004 to October 17th
is lost.Due to this snafu, I will end
the log after this trip, print a hard copy and maintain a new copy of the log.

This is now volume 2 of the BR log.I have saved the complete original to disk
and will soon be producing a hardcopy for keeping aboard Beyond Reason.

Lisa and I are enjoying the trip this weekend to Horseshoe
Cove.We have sailed 15 years on the
bay and never dropped by the cove or the Presidio Yacht club.

I had spent some time
during the previous week contacting the harbor master at the Travis Sailing
Center at the Presidio
Yacht Club.According to the harbor
master there was plenty of room within the cove to anchor out.In reality the cove has limited but adequet
swing for 3 yachts or so.

A full blitz of the cove would be difficult with more
boats, and as we eventually found out the wind can come up quickly and requires
that your place enough scope to hold you in all wind conditions.

Before we set the anchor we tried to contact the club and
eventually contacted one of the men on the Coast Guard lifeboats that are
stationed in the cove.According to the
Coast Gaurdsmen, we were able to anchor anywhere within the cove.

We tried to stay out of the way of incoming boats dropping
anchor near the center of the cove, and paying out about 100’ of scope (15’
water).

In typical fashion we stormed the club for drinks after
working up a nice lunch of white beans and squash, followed by the making of
dough for dinner bread later in the day.

The club was vacant and the bartender explained that the
club is made of mostly military members who live in other parts of the
country.The atmosphere was warm,
though they have don away with a fabled grand fireplace, which actually turned
out to be a propane induced fire pit. Either way, it is gone now due to fire code.

After the quick trip to the club, we were encouraged by
the beer to find our way out the cove and into the teeth of the Golden Gate.The
teeth I refer too are actually the rocks on the northeast side of the gate.The tide was running so we actually did not
go under the gate (yet), and finished up with just a quick trip around the
harbor.

Home again we plopped the now risen dough into the over
and within 40 minutes had a beautiful loaf of fresh bread that we chased with
our bean stew and Ironstone Cabernet.

Dinner was followed by a short dingy trip on the now
moonlight waters of the cove to the Yacht club dingy dock.We had decided to go for a walk since the
weather was clear and warm enough to enjoy in shorts and a sweatshirt if one
was inclined.

On the walk we discovered that San Francisco had a department of Hazardous
substance, that had closed down the lower road that use to go around the base
of the bridge.The closure was due to
lead paint.We continued up another
road that lead under the bridge.

Lisa had some concern as there where barricades set up in
a brick-brack formation to keep cars out, yet no signs to keep out
pedestrians.No, we did not have to
step over any barricade either.

At the top of the hill, we turned around to go back to the
boat.This is when we found Officer
Brown of the Golden Gate Police department.

Officer Brown asked if we had enjoyed our walk and said
his group had been following us on sensors and Closed Loop TV’s during our
trip.It’s a good thing we had been
good.

After a light interrogation, we were free to mosey back to
the boat.In-route we ran into 2 skunks,
and managed to get them to move off the path without spraying us.All in all a very nice walk.

As the morning light came up the next day, we broke
tradition and woke up early. We Cleaned up from the night before and matching
time with the slack tide, boarded the dingy for an assault on the Golden Gate.

It felt odd to be going under the gate in a dingy.By all accounts it was calm with a slight
overcast.It would have been simple to
even go under the bridge on a wooden raft had we wanted.All the same, there was an overshadowing
sence that this trip was wrong, or could go wrong.

As we began to go under
the bridge, I found myself increasing the revs on the outboard, just to be sure
the engine did not die at the most inappropriate moment.Of course nothing went wrong and we were
rewarded by seeing some very interesting rock formations just under the bridge,
a result of the California
coast being up-heaved by seismic conditions.

We returned again and explored the Fort Baker
historical site before heading for home.

Fort
Baker at one time must
have been beautiful and for sure still is, except the buildings on close
inspection are beginning to deteriorate quite rapidly.As we wandered through the site, we wondered
why the State or Government could not create a Condo type arrangement with the
public, to have the homes rebuilt in exact conformance with the original homes,
and keep the park open to the public, yet have the homes privately owned to
reduce cost.

Today’s departure was a little late.We attended the general meeting of the
Oakland YC and left with another $25.00 in increased fees.Our destination today, staying with the
theme of new and exotic ports around San Francisco
bay, is Belvadere Cove in Tiburan
CA.

This is another of those ports that we just haven’t paid
any attention to in the last 9 or 10 years.We did once try to stay at the Corinthian YC but we were kicked out
before we could even tie up to the guest dock. Our attempt this time will be
more stealthy as we will just drop anchor in the harbor and run to shore before
anyone can identify us.

The wind is very light
but we are able to pick up enough to pull us from the entrance of the estuary
to behind Angel Island.This works well as we don’t know the harbor at Corinthian.Once the sails are down we motor the short
distance to the harbor.The entrance
looks similar to what I remember, congested and unforgiving to a boat with
limited handling and a large bow sprit.

We decide against the entrance and head directly for the
mooring.It is only a quick call to the
YC and we are actually given permission to tie up for the night free of
charge.The club sent out a boat to get
our registration and we were free for the weekend.

We got kind of a late start to begin with so we dropped
the dingy in the water and motored off to Sams.Sam’s is an icon on the bay, though we have never visited before.For the most part Sam’s is occupied by
sailors and folks in their 30’s who probably wish they were younger.This suits us just fine, since we fit this
category well, if not on the older side.

The restaurant is mostly a large patio that holds about
300 people and seats 250.It is jammed,
but perfect and we settle into bottled Pabst Blue Ribbon beer and
sandwiches.It is November and all that
is needed is a light sweatshirt to enjoy the sun and fresh air.

Tiburon itself is like stepping onto a movie set.The main street off the harbour looks just
too fake.The stores are all on a zero
lot line, though there are not strip malls.Each store front is different.We
didn’t stop into many of the stores as the pricing was over our budget, but the
stroll was delightful.

As the sun was going down we retired back to the vessel
and finished the night reading and enjoying the fire.

Morning brought a beautiful sunrise and required a dingy
ride around Tiburan point.There was not
much activity around the harbours so after a tank a fuel was burned we cleaned
up and prepared for going ashore to take in a movie (Ray) and finish off the
weekend.

The tide was with us on the way home and it was a quick
trip and since the wind had completely died by the time we got home, docking
and securing was easy and fast.

Departed Alameda for South Beach.We are expecting the weather to stay clear
tonight, but the pundits are saying otherwise.As we roll down the estuary the sun is out and the weather fine for
short sleeves and possibly short pants if they were available.

As we are clearing the estuary we call into South Beach
harbor and ask for a place to ties up to for the night.Lisa and I want to hang out tonight at the
Embarcadero and see the fireworks.

I have spent about 15 minutes on the phone with South
beach and I not had any luck in securing a berth.In the back of my mind I am hoping the
weather goes south so anyone with plans to stay over at South Beach
will cancel, thus providing us an opportunity tonight.

Following another ½ hour of great sailing, the weather
begins to quickly change for the worst.You can see the squalls up ahead, and Lisa smartly suggests the foul
weather gear.Normally I am reluctant
to subscribe to the wearing of the gear, as it is positive reinforcement that
the day will not turn out fine.

Since I wished for this weather I oblige and am handed up
both bottoms and tops.Lisa stays below
to warm soup while I get ready to do battle.

We are sailing very near the coast guard station and in
the channel.As if on queue with wind and
rain, a large cargo ship comes past and requires us to exit the channel toward Treasure island, we are there essentially becalmed but
pelted with rain, due to the wind shadow of the island.

One the ship clears, there is another waiting in the
opposite direction and the scenario continues.We burnt up an easy hour waiting for both
ships and their accompanying tugs to clear before we were on our way.

When the squalls finished they left us with zero wind and
so we rolled along at bear steerage toward our destination.

As 2 o’clock
came by, we arrived at our quazi destination and entered the harbor.From the number of empty berths we felt for
sure we would score a place for the night and were not disappointed when we
called and confirmed a spot.

Once we settled in, the rain started coming in earnest
with a steady pelting.The dog needed a
walk, so we both donned our rain gear and went ashore.

The Ferry building has really changed since the last time
we visited and now is filled with shops and deli’s that will make this a much
better destination.We returned to the
boat around 6pm and had a
dinner of butterflied shrimp, and collard green for the New Year.

Near 10 pm
we strolled out to the embarcadero for drinks and to ring in the New Year.The fire works display was most likely
awesome, but due to our location, palm trees were in the way for the better
part of the show.

The weather forecast does not look good for the trip
around the Alameda
today.The barometer reading above is
the lowest that I have ever seen in the bay area, though I don’t suggest that
the reading actually has any significance, as this is not something that I
monitor very often.

Due to the tide we are not in a hurry to depart and
finally cast off the lines around 9 am.The day is looking quite nice and the
barometer is on the rise.We follow the
excellent directions on the Aeolian YC’s website, and have no problem with the
depth.

We confidently call the YC’s duty officer and have no
problem berthing to an end tie and proudly march up to the bar for Gin Fizz’s,
Bloody Marys and chili.

We meet Gerry and Judy Greth aboard Tortuga Del
Mar at the club as well and they suggest we continue to Ballena YC for a real
lunch.We have not been in Ballena YC
in many years so follow their lead to the entrance.

Because of a time constraint, the turtle must reconsider
and takes their leave to return home.

Lisa and I had a quiet time at Ballena, and returned to
the boat to consider the nights destination.

We eventually decide on heading home, and make our return
approx 8 pm that night and
turn in exhausted.

Well it has been a while since I have sat down to jot up
one of our adventures.We have been
sailing several times this year, and for the most part the weather has
cooperated.One of the items we had not
been able to do was to get together with Kathy and Dino Bartolin of the HC 43
Delphineous.

We had first met Kathy and Dino at the Lighted Boat Parade
in Dec 2004.Since Delphineous is a
sister ship to Beyond Reason and Kathy and Dino both have the same outlook on
cruising the Lisa and I share, we have really looked forward to our first sail.

The weather today is not a disappointment.It is mid February and I am already finding
beads of sweat on my brow when I open a beer up to fast or am too heavy handed
shaking up the next margarita.Unfortunately I am the only one who has the morning off, so impatiently
I wait for my crew to finish class.

Lisa is finally let out of charting class around 1500 and
it will be a race to get to Point Blunt by Sunset.Monday is Valentines day and I really did
want to make Sunset.

After the final preps we pull out of the slip and
Delphineous is just coming up the estuary to meet us.

Although the boats are sister ships, there are marked
differences, both in outward appearance and within the structure of the
boats.Delphineous is a “Performance
keel” or mark II, with Pullman berth and
Yanmar engine.Outwardly she carry’s
tanbark sails and a slightly smaller jib and mizzen than BR.I have my doubt that we can compete with
them in an upwind duel, but only time will tell.

The trip up the estuary is uneventful as mostly we are
motoring and slowing raising sails according to the direction of the wind.Once out of the estuary and under the Bay Bridge,
we begin to adjust sails with earnest and as we cross the Northern Tip of
Treasure Island, there are 15 knots of wind coming almost directly from our
destination.

The angle of the wind is not normal, as this would usually
be close reach to Point Blunt.

We stay close to Delphineous, but eventually have to fall
off just slightly to relieve pressure in the main.We could have reefed but by the time the wind
kicked up to 25 knots, it was easier to just crack off a bit and retrace the
1/4 mile we would lose to Delphineous in the end.

It was impressive to see both boat in full canvas under
the pressure of the wind, and I do believe we could match the “performance
keel” in speed had we taken the time to either pull the traveler to leeward, or
reefed down to the first point on the main.Even taking in the mizzen would have rewarded us with extra speed.

Delphineous had trouble setting their hook in the normally
good holding ground, but our tackle grabbed first time out.We had made it in time to blow up the dingy
and set out to watch the sunset.

Something I have had to learn over and over again is not
to rush the cruise.It always leads to
uncomfortable feelings between myself and the admiral.I did, it did and I should have just relaxed
and waited for the right moment to begin the evening.

So, after dropping the hook, we worked on dinner and
eventually went to get the Delphinenans.Dinner was homemade bread, Chicken Marsella and wine, lots of wine
actually more wine that should have been drunk, but then again it’s all for
fun.

Following dinner we all packed into the dinghy and
finished off the evening on Delphineous watching the video of Captain Ron for
the 10th time.We had a
great time.

The morning brought overcast sky’s an a slight
drizzle.We were up early and worked on
breakfast, while the Delphini appeared to sleep.The excuse from Dino and Cathy were that
Dino was tired, but I suspect the wine may have had an effect.

To wear off the edge of last evening all 800 lbs of us,
rolled into the dingy and motored off in grand style to the shore.We didn’t have more than 2” of free board
(tube) above the water in the rear of the dingy were Dino and I were enjoying a
morning cocktail.The girls of course
had more room.

The excitement came when were rode over several ferry
waves and lived to tell the tale.So a
quick trip to shore then back to the boats to weigh anchor.As usual our washdown pump only works at the
dock, so I am up front with 1 foot on the windlass, 1 foot on the railing, and all
three hands occupied with buckets of water, scrub brushes and a finger pointed
at the comfounded pump that won’t work.

By midmorning we are free and off on a light breeze
towards home.Plenty of time of
pictures, a relaxing lunch under sail and back into the berth by 5 pm.

Were here! Or so Lisa has called out.We are at the entrance to Clipper Cove.Lat 37’49.133N, Long 122’21.753W and
stuck.It is 11:30 AM and by the looks of the tide chart we
have another 1 hour to go before the tide turns.

The tide is a Minus 0.7 (-0.7)tomorrow is only a –0.5.I have surveyed the intire area and
determined that on the very North side can be accessed and only in other than
minus tides.It appears that the
lagoon has filled in to approx 6.5 feet on a zero tide.

The shoal begins to drop once abreast of the small sailing
center ramp..

As we sat, Lisa decided to do a little waxing on
deck.This was our original plan anyway
so we are not losing time, nor really concerned about the tide.I have turned on Onay just to put a couple
of amps into the batteries.The start
time was 1230, and we were short by –147 amps.

We got off the shoal approx 1330.We have additional amperage, but the sun is
now gone and the marine layer has dropped in.Unfortunately it does not appear this is going to clear up..

Boy,tough night
last night.Sparky was really a handful
at the OYC.Apparently some female dog
was in heat and it was a real struggle to get him to calm down.Eventually it took a quick argument for Lisa
and I to decide to take him for a forced walk.

If Sparky could talk, it would be the trail of tears that
he went on, but I was able to handle the stride through the entire 3 plus
miles.When we got back to OYC he was
pooped and slept till about 7am.

This morning was kind of a struggle, as Lisa and I were
still kind of upset with each other.Eventually Lisa went to the store with Spark and I washed the boat down
from all the work we have done in the last couple of month.

When we departed (0900) we were in OK spirits and enjoyed
a very relaxed and slow trip to McNears
Beach.When we arrived the wind was just in between
zephers and turning.We inflated the
dinghy and took the dog for a more subdued walk on the beach.The walk turned into a “boat and drink” trip
on the way back, so even though we only traveled about a mile each way, it took
the better part of 4 hours.

Sparky is now happily soaking up the sun on the deck, Lisa
is in the shower cleaning up and I am writing to you.I am just about to drop the match into the
propane and ignite the BBQ.We have Tri
tip on the menu, so this should be nice.

The evening looks like it will be spectacular as the wind
should decreese soon.It is only
blowing in the low teens, so don’t believe that there is any stress on the boats
anchor.So far, this is a spectacular 2
day holiday.

We had an excellent dinner tonight.The wind died down by 5pm and we enjoyed the night listening to Kirsty
MacColl and Elvis.It Couldn’t get
better; except for the Punch Puro Grande cigar that concluded the night
Date: 07/02/05,
Delta

Departure Port: OYC, Alameda

Lat:
Long:

Pressure

Goodness, it has been a while since I have written in the
log.Was I sure we had documented this
trip to the Delta, but apparently it was soo much fun that we forgot to do any
note taking at all.

By the time I finish hear I hope I remember at least some
of the names of the folks we met along the way.

We departed at exactly 0600 on Saturday Morning.Lisa was not able to get off on Friday so
this would have to be a quick 3 day run to the Delta.The wind appeared in our favor out of the
estuary, but not wanting to miss the incoming tide; we motored out the estuary,
through the bay and didn’t shut down till we passed the Richmond San Rafael
Bridge.

Our timing was perfect as we met the tide correctly and
the wind was just edging up into the low teens.With the engine shut down, we began the trip in earnest.Although we were in a rush to get to the
delta, we never raised the main, just Jib and Jigger.My though was it would be too much effort to
pull the main down when/if the wind piped up around Middle Ground.

It was not long before we cleared the Carcinuez Bridge
and were met with the decision to clear under the Benicia Union
Pacific Bridge.The tide was carrying us much quicker towards
the usually open train bridge, so I pulled in the jib while trying to glance at
the bridge height on the map.

Beyond Reason had never been this far east in Northern CA,
so I had to make a quick judgment call on the actual height of the mast.Last time I measured I think we were 54’,
but I am relying on my memory.I didn’t
have much time to make a decision, so I looked at the mast, looked at the
bridge, the mast again, and then the mizzen sail which was sending us toward
our destiny much quicker than I had hoped.

At the last minute I powered up the engine and shoved the
transmission into reverse.It was a
crossed feeling of sickness and “to hell with it all we are going for it” as
the tide and wind overcame all my efforts to stop the forward motion of the
boat and slowly slide us under the bridge with just a few feet to spare.

Once clear, we continued on our way in the shallows of the
Suisun bay, did I mention, our depth sounder is only functional above 9’!

As we got deeper (shallower actually) into the bay the
wind piped up as expected.Before too
long we were seeing steady 20 plus knot.All of it was on the stern so we had a good time all the way.

New York Cut at one time was very shallow but has now been
dredged all the way from east to west allowing a clear passage through to the
delta.Minimum depth is now about 20’
so this was quite a surprise for us.Our
original intentions were to turn to port rather than starboard at the entrance
but the main river channel has moved or at least is not marked as well as the
cut.

The norm is for the wind to die down once you reach Antioch, but today the
waves cut down as per the book, but the winds continued to increase.At one point we were hitting close to 9
knots (estimated) up the San Joaquin in 30
plus knots of wind.

When we finally reached the cut-off for Potato slough, we
found we had spent about 8 hours on the water.We dropped anchor in the first of several bedrooms.The average depth was less than 9’ so we
really had no idea how deep the water was.Once secure (100’ of chain, dropped in very shallow water with a stern
anchor to prevent any drift, as if!) we quickly adjusted our dress, our liquid
enjoyment selection, our music and inflated the dingy for explore.

It didn’t take long before we were having the time of our
lives, idling the dingy up and down the bedrooms, poking our heads every nook
and addressing anyone who looked like fun.Sparky was please to be off the boat for the first time in several
hours, and he showed it when we splashed through wave at full power and the
waves sprayed over the front, drenching him.

Within the hour most of the folks in the area knew Sparky,
though Lisa and I were less famous.It
was a warm night and we stayed up late looking at the stars and enjoying the
fact that we weren’t sweating like we would be at home, and we weren’t freezing
like we may be on the bay.

When morning dawned we ate breakfast and all hands were
asked to assemble in the dingy for a trip around Mandeville Tip and Venice Island.We estimated the distance to be about 8 – 10
miles, but were prepared to turn around if things didn’t look right.

Lucky for us, by the
time we reached Mandeville Tip we were warm and happily drinking and drifting
(or idling) through the anchorage.I have never seen anything that compares to
the humanity anchored at Mandeville.Without exaggeration there were no less than 1,000 boats anchored in the
main anchorage and adjoining cuts.If
you have ever seen the TV commercials about “Girls Gone Wild” you can just
about imagine what this place would look like in the evenings.

Since we were passing through in the early morning, it was
mostly folks preparing for the afternoon BBQ’s drinking, water skiing and
finally the fireworks in the evening (July 3rd due to the fourth
being on a Sunday).

We passed by Baron Hiltons house.Baron Hilton is part of the Hilton Hotel
fortune and puts on the fireworks display.We would later see Mr. Hilton near Herman and Helens resort, with his
dog and jeep.The home is unassuming
and for someone who owns a fortune very modest.

Passing out of the anchorage, we turned to continue our
course around the island.The
Anacharous Grass was thick in places and required nearly as much attention as
the boats speeding along at a speed that threatened out existence.

It took an easy hour to make Herman and Helens resort, so
we were starting to crisp up by the time we arrived.Ice Cream was the requirement, but when we
heard about triple thick shakes, we just had to make the switch.Lisa felt she had banked enough diet points
just handing me beers, that she didn’t even flinch at accepting the offer and
enjoyment.

The remainder of the trip went without incident save for
the ski boat that came by with an inflatable NAKED doll strapped to the ski
arch.

We arrived just as the last beer was emptied.Lisa quickly set about making additional
boat drinks so we could take another spin through the bedroom anchorages.On this last swing through, we wanted to stop
and meet the owner of an HC38 MarkII named Katherine.

It is unfortunate that I can not remember the gentleman’s
name but he and his wife have lived aboard for some time.I thought I had written down his and his
wife’s name, but we will forever remember him as Dr. Death.

When we met him, we thought he was either washing the
waterline or doing some work on the bulwark, we were wrong, he was killing
spiders.Here is another reason to
varnish the sides.Dr. Death had lived
in the delta for a number of years (perhaps 10) and in the spring, spiders
would hold up between the boards.Dr
Death truly had developed a plan as he would not kill the first spiders to come
along, as he considered these as tourists, he waited for the big explosion that
would come in June and July.

As it turned out, Dr Death had a large can of RAID in his
hands and was spraying it deep into the cracks, and really enjoyed watching as
the spiders clamored out of the hull.

Dr. Death claimed he was one of the first to work on Steam
Powered computer back in the 70’s but I think he was just pulling our legs.

We ventured back to the boat as the sun was thinking about
going down, and created a nice dinner while we waited in the warm summer air
for the fireworks to begin.It is tough
to write about fireworks, they are all beautiful.These were neither the greatest nor the
worst we had seen, but the setting was spectacular, and certainly made the
evening one of the most enjoyable.

We got out on the early tide on the morning of July 4th,0300 to be exact, or so we had
thought.Turns out the double anchor
set up we had was working very well and it took a dingy launch (we had deflated
earlier in preparation) to get the aft anchor up.

There was a slight mist over the water which really turned
on the romance of leaving port.Several
animals/creatures were seen swimming through the mist and navigation was
difficult with the lack of depth sounder, but we made the main ship channel
without incident.

The trip looked like it would be pretty painless, but
knowing we still had more than 6 hours of travel left anything could
happen.As the sun rose we noticed a
haze on the water that eventually filled in to near blindingor total obscuring of visibility.

The haze/smoke made for an incredible sun rise but
breathing was more difficult as we entered into the heart of the
situation.

It turned out that there
was a brush fire near the river and the haze and smoke lasted for nearly ½
hour, the effects of the smoke lasted for nearly 3 hours.

The remainder of the trip went according to plan.Quite a lot of wind on the nose in Middle Harbor
and also in San Pablo
bay, but mostly this was just a nuisance that slowed us down.

We arrived back at the club around 1400, cleaned up and
called it a good weekend.

Overcast and Grey, weather forecast is for clear sky’s
later this morning.Departure time
should be approximately 1000 .Destination is unknown at this time, but the candidates are Corinthian
YC or Angel Island.

The wind was up for this trip.Once we cleared the Alameda buoy we saw numbers in the 20’s which
would increase to 30 – 36 knots after we cleared the bay bridge.With our knowledge we set just the mizzen
and staysail, but this proved to be ineffective.We have found, and continued to find that
Beyond Reason requires at leasta small
amount of jib to maintain any type of forward motion, and as we let out the jib
we made a distance gain in speed.

It took a while to fight
the fickle wind near the Oakland
Bay Bridge,
but once clear we notice another HC 43 to port which was running a parallel
course to ours.Unfortunately I had
wanted to sail the city front so we tacked to port, and at the time we crossed
paths with the other HC, we were nearly 1 mile behind them.

A tack to starboard put us on an identical course to the
other HC, and the race was on.According
to Robert of Sidney Shane, we literally walked them.Taking just about ½ hour to overcome out 1
mile deficit and pass them at Alcatraz.

Sidney Shane was under Full main and Staysail, but
obviously could have done with more sail.The wind was full at 30 knots and both boats were sailing quite
comfortably.I don’t have to tell you
how excited we were to have taken them so quickly.

Our continued course was to Corinthian YC and
Tiburon.Seems this is a very good spot
for Lisa and me.We enjoy the
restaurants, the shops and most of all the movie theater.

We spent the remainder of the afternoon and evening on
shore, and returned for a restful sleep and then back for breakfast.

This truly is a great place to unwind, as the mooring is
easy, the prices fair if you look around a little and it is easy to get out the
next morning.

Today will be the first trip we have had with Dino and
Cathy in almost 2 months.We are
looking forward to stories of their trip to Catalina.

F#$k, F@#K, F^&K!, we have green fluid coming out of
the exhaust immediately after we start the motor.I quickly shut the engine down and do a
quick inventory of what might have caused the issue.

Not believing my eyes and believing that it may have just
been “green algae water”, I try the engine again.This time the exhaust runs clear.On a suggestion, I put the engine in gear
and let her run to temperature prior to checking the exhaust.With disappointment I shut the engine down
again.The entire berth has turned an
Irish green.There is no doubt; we will
not be sailing today.

I am now writing this after many of the events have
unfolded and again I stress to my self, ‘ONLY OPEN 1 PROJECT AT A TIME”.This rule is good regardless of if the
systems are inter-related or not.

After the discovery, we immediately began looking for
clues to our problem.The first and
easiest of the solutions was the heat exchanger.Everyone we asked immediately confirmed that
we were freshwater cooled and then exclaimed that obviously a pipe had collapsed
and we were pulling water from the fresh system.

In the back of my head I kept hearing a mechanic I use
say, “no way is the heat exchanger an issue, it is nickel coated and will never
corrode.We didn’t listen to the voice
in my head and I tore the exchanger apart anyway.

I don’t know who Mr. Murphy’s friend is that laughs at all
good pieces of equipment that are torn into and virtually destroyed in the
process of locating an issue, but he was definitely having a time today.

Within the hour we
had opened and even pressure tested the exchanger.No dice, not the issue.Next in line was to recheck all the hoses,
verify the pluming and assure that there could be absolutly nothing simple
(KISS) which could have created the problem.

After another round of marina maintenance mitigation, it
was determined that the next logical was the exhaust manifold.We all discussed the head gaskets and
cylinder wall (KISS), what since the engine ran almost perfectly (except the
green fluid) these were dismissed as not plausible.

I perhaps should have given this next teardown a bit more
time to sink in.Although it sounded
logical, there was still something bugging me regarding the problem, I just
couldn’t put my mind around the issue.

The manifold had given
me a cause for alarm several months ago when on of the return elbows was
leaking, or appeared to leak some liquid, so that may have clouded
judgment.Anyway, the manifold came off
fairly easily, but once removed gave no clue to the problem.The biggest issue with the manifold was that
you could see inside it to locate any potential leaks.

Lisa doesn’t allow me to play with hack saws anymore, but
at the time we did not have the rule in place.The hacksaw made easy work of the rusted
and stuck bolts that secured the expansion tank and exhaust tail piece.

As usual Murphy’s friend again was laughing as a
completely operable manifold lay in three pieces on the dock.

OK, so all my junior mechanics say you wouldn’t be able to
tell if there was a crack in the manifold or not since it was most likely
pressure related.Again, something
didn’t feel right, the manifold looked great and there was no trace of water
having been inthe exhaust ports, but
just the same we took the neutered parts home and the following Monday placed
an order for $1200.00 worth of new manifold from Blue Ridge Marine.

To make matters worse, the clerk at Blue
Ridge was pushy and wanted to sell me just about everything he
could.I sank deeper into debt but
still was not confident we had found the problem.

The following night, I had a vision.This is normal for me, as given enough time
I usually am able to fall upon the correct reason or diagnosis for an
issue.Turns out the actual reason for
the trouble was inter-related to the generator.I had forgotten the whole time that I had
been working on the generator during the previous week.

During my previous week I had diagnosed and began fixing
the seal between the fresh and saltwater impellors for the generator.I had forgotten two things, #1 the
Generator and the engine use the same central water intake, #2 I had added
quite a bit of Green die (it looked red in the bottle) to the fresh water
circulation system of the generator a week earlier.

So once the manifold was pressure tested everything was
confirmed and a firm lesson had been learned, 1 project at a time.

I will not belabor the log with the actual frustration
experienced when reassembling the manifold and the accompanying gaskets, but
suffice it to say, the project was just finished August 26th, and we
had worked during every weekend and many of the weeknights between this log
entry and the 26th.

I should caution that I have not re-tested the engine, as
tomorrow (27th) I want to dive on the boat and clean the intake prior
to starting anything.

8/27/05.The dive is completed and as expected the
intake was covered in seaweed.With the
intake cleaned the engine was started and ran for an hour without incident.

Well, we are off.It is not quite 0600, but then again we were supposed to leave by 0500
to make the tide.The morning looks
good and the boat is running well with tanks filled and all the wood and dead
animals on board.

We are all prepared for what the pilgrims would have
considered a feast.It has been a long
standing dream of mine to sail up to Drakes
Bay and cook a pig on the
beach with all the proper fixin’s for a beach party/Clam bake.

There has actually been a lot more coordinating required
for this trip than I would have liked.Fire permits were required for a beach fire, the pig and clams needed to
be ordered a week in advance, weather was continually watched to develop the
trends for the final forecast, Marine Reserve Areas were charted to be sure
that any crabbing done was done within the law (this time) as well as crab
identification research

(Rock crabs can be taken
larger than 4 “by the shortest distance through the body fro the edge of the
shell to the edge of the shell

“Another species similar to, but
smaller than the Dungeness, is the red crab, rock crab, or red rock crab. Since
this crab usually measures less than six inches across the back, it is less
meaty than the Dungeness. It does have delicious meat, however, and is
characterized by large claws. Where present in considerable abundance, the red
crab is a serious predator on both oysters and hard-shell clams. In some areas,
controls have been necessary to prevent undue damage to clam and oyster crops.
It can be distinguished from the Dungeness by the presence of black on the tips
of its pinchers and by its red coloration and prefers rocky substrates...”)

Now once all the research was completed and the stores
laid in all we needed to be concerned with was the repairs we had made over the
last couple of weeks.

So off we went, buddy boating with our good friends Dino,
Cathy and Nina Bortolin.As is our
trademark the tides failed to move in our immediate direction, so progress was
much slower than we had anticipated.We
pulled up a double reefed main just short of the Golden Gate Bridge,
with winds piping up just short of 20 knots.We did not want to tempt fate at this early juncture as we anticipate
the winds to increase along the way based on the marine weather channel.

As we nosed out past
Point Bonita it was beginning to dawn on me that this would be a terrific
passage.The seas were very benign and
none of the swells appeared to be over 4 feet.The wind was not in our favor, but certainly was not kicking up anything
uncomfortable.We motor sailed forward
keeping an eye on the engine and enjoying the ride.

By 1300, the weather was still holding but the overcast
still had not cleared.I don’t know
that I really expected a clearing, but it would have been nice.

When Point
Reyes finally came into sight, Lisa had gone below for some sleep;
passages always make her tired.We
dropped anchor by 1600 in 14 ft of water and a very calm Drakes Bay
anchorage.There were many more boats
at the anchorage than we had previously witness, but it was Labor Day so
perhaps we should have expected it.

It was not so crowded
that we couldn’t find space, but with nearly 15 boats in the bay there were
more in this one day than on 3 previous trips.

Regardless, the day
brightened up and was gorgeous.We
anchored in 15 feet and had the blender going soon afterward.Dino and Cathy were a little more patient
and made several laps around the bay testing the bottom with their anchor until
it felt just right.

We spent the remainder
of the day relaxing and trying to get dinner on the table.It was an early night for us all as we
turned in at about 11pm
instead of the usual 2 am.

In the morning we got
moving.We hadn’t surveyed the beaches
for a good “pig cookin’” spot the day before so this needed to be
accomplished.As a matter of fact we
hadn’t done anything the day before so the dingy still needed air before we
were able to survey,transfer beer, haul
wood and load up all the fixin’s and charcoal, lighter fluid, turning spit and
ferry it all to the beach that we hadn’t found yet.

We started around 7 am, but the transfer of the pig
didn’t occur till nearly 11 am.Once we got everything set up, we ran into
some technical issue with the turning spit that could only be solved with
bailing wire and American ingenuity, alright bailing wire and a wish and a
prayer is more like it.

By noon we had modified enough of the beach to
create a nice pit and some right nice seating arrangements for the girls.

One word of caution when
doing a beach barbeque, be careful of the rocks chosen.Our beach only had sandstone’s and we
hadn’t expected that many of them contained fissures and air pockets that when
superheated by the wood would suddenly explode and send searing hot shards
everywhere but mainly in the direction of the plastic dinghy’s. Wth the wood heating the pig well it was time to get the party rolling so we enjoyed libations, snacks, fresh clams baked over the fire and the warm summer sun. It was

absolutely the nicest
weather I have ever seen at Drakes, ever.

The surf was such that
landing on the beach was nearly effortless and the weather warm enough to stay
in short and a light T-shirt all day and most of the night.

Once the pig was
finished cooking (7PM) we
got to eating and the temperature started to drop, so in good fashion we
started the bon fire and really got thing warmed up.At one point we thought we had light the
surrounding hills on fire, but we were only mistaken, it was one of the party
favors we had with tinfoil on it.

Just about the time we
broke things up the surf started pounding in.There were some tense moments as we maneuvered the boats into the water
filled with trash, chairs, coolers and the like to the point of near
overflowing, but after timing the waves, we were off the beach with hardly a
scratch.

We left a phosphoresant
trail as we all motored toward the boats anchored ½ mile away.Lisa and I just dumped everything in the
cockpit and called it a night.With the
exception of a brief 25 knot breeze that picked up 1 hour after we made it to
the boat, the night was quite and peaceful.

We were up with the
morning light and puttered about with breakfast, cleaning the sand of the dingy
and just enjoying the sunrise.ActuallyLisa and I sat on the
coach roof for almost an hour watching the sun rise and drinking coffee before
we really got the day started.We
figured the ride home would be around 4 hours, especially if the wind picked
up, so we parlayed with Delphinius and decided 11 am would be a good departure time.

Seams lately we can not
complete a trip without some sort of alarm going off.This was true on this trip as well when the
bilge light turned on.We were just off
Bolinas reef when I noticed the bright red light.A quick check of the bilge confirmed that
we appeared to be sinking, albeit with green fluid again.

The bilge was
resplendent with approx 6” of bright green water in the aft bilge and a ¼ ‘ of
green in the main engine room.I was
not overly concerned with the amount of water, but did check all the
connections that we had recently made to the exhaust system.It was perplexing that the water did not
appear to be coming in or going out till we determined that the bilge just
wasn’t picking up water.

To alleviate the issue,
we employed the larger outside bilge pump and quickly the light went out
indicating the bilge was clear.

Within 15 minutes we
were sinking again, same green fluid, same amount of water.The large pump again was employed and again
the light went out and a bilge check confirmed all was well again.

On the third time I
finally determined we were just moving the small amount of water from the bilge
into the 2” pipe that connects to the large bilge pump and after pumping the
bilge pump would drain back to the bilge and the light would ignite.

Additional to this
discovery I determined that the pitching fore and aft had actually drained the
upper reaches of the bilges to the aft section and that we really didn’t have a
leaking problem, just a draining problem.We turned off the bilge pump for repair/cleaning at the dock, and
enjoyed the sail home.

To be truthful, the trip
from Drakes to around Duxbury reef was a motor boat ride.We had the sails up, but they were really
just for shade.Once off Duxbury reef,
the wind began to fill and carrier us down the coast at a reasonable clip.

As we should have expected the ebb began without us being at the gate and soon we were sailing into a good 3 knot ebb tide.We stayed in close to Fort Cronkite; the northern edge of the Golden
Gate channel, and left 50 feet of

water under us at all
time, but because of the eddies created got a pretty good boost towards the
Gate.

Inside the Golden Gate, the winds picked up and picked up till we
were flying down the bay in 25 – 30 knots with every rag flying.Delphinius had pulled away from us in the
beginning, but as the wind built we began to reel them in.It was very dramatic seeing two HC 43
ketches flying everything and pushing against the ebb whilst lesser boats were
reefed in hard and trying to maintain control.Woo hoo!.

Good looking day today.Lisa and I motored over to Angel
Island yesterday and took
up a mooring.We came just to relax and
mostly that is what has happened.

We took up the moorings nearest the east end, forgetting
that the current runs pretty heavy through the anchorage.With an ebb projected at nearly 5 knots
through the gate and us being in Racoon Straight we were going to see the
better part of the current.

No real issues except the bow line was pressing pretty
heavily against the bobstay/cheese cutter.We solved the issue quickly by adding a second line off the port side
and then relieving the bridle of all tension.Problem solved and back to relaxing.

This morning we took to the island and walked the
perimeter for fun (5.2 miles).There is
some major renovation happening on the island near the east garrison.Apparently Arnold Scwartznegger has
authorized funds for the rebuilding of all the old buildings, so in another
couple of years it should be very nice.

I have spent the day reading and having a couple of
beers.Lisa is outside working on the
bottom scum andpolishing up the
hull.Nice life huh.

The weather is calling for Freezing temperatures and above
1500 feet, snow in the bay area; seems like a good time to go sailing.

There has been much work on the boat over the last couple
of months.We had the raw water pump go
out on us the last time we went for a sail, so that needed to be replaced
(Shearwood pump, $500.00).Had a couple
of more engine leaks that need to be taken care of and the washdown pump is
still not working.

To keep us going between mechanical problems we did a
little varnishing, created some new shelves and ordered some new toys for the
trip next year.

Our trip out the estuary yesterday was very nice.We don’t often get a chance to sail directly
down the estuary, but with the low weather system in the area, the wind was
coming from the south east and it made for a nice sail.

We got tangled up at the finish line of one of the
numerous races in the bay, which gave us a chance to do a Chinese fire drill
trying to recover ourselves.I don’t
like to take the right of way when we approach a race so a last minute jib was
in order to round away from the race.

Arrival at Angel
Island was pleasantly
cold with intermitant cold rain, but the wind had dropped and allowed for
anchoring in expected calm damp surroundings.The dinghy was next on the list to get up and running.Sparky has no patience for us when it come
time to visit islands, so once pumped up, we set off to explore the beaches and
pee and each of the outcroppings.

Dinner consisted of stew and Sourdough bread with a movie
afterward.As expected the wind did
come up in the anchorage around 2230, and with it blowing in the “low pressure”
direction, we had a lee shore with rocks directly behind us.

The anchorage was not rolling but very fore and aft
bouncy.This made for a tough night for
me.It was comfortable in bed, but my
thoughts continued to dwell on the anchor, so I only got about 3 hours of
sleep, such is the life of a wannabe cruiser.

All was well last night, save that we forgot to turn off
the water heater when we left the dock, so the batteries are drained an Onay is
on now to help recharge the bank.The
sun is shinning and we are waiting for our radio schedule to start at 0900
today.

Our plan for the radio is to try and contact Damon Sarin
in Guatimala.Damon is one of our
friends from the HCOA club.He was
visiting over the last couple of months and we figured this would be a great
time to try out the SSB radio (Kenwood TKM707) that we had modified for Ham
radio use.I didn’t meantion it
earlier, but I did get my Ham license over the last month.

Boy, seems all we ever do is go to Angel Island,
sorry about that.We have been other
places over the last month, but just not much to write about…I like
action.

So here we are enjoying the first good weather we have had
in nearly 5 months; no rain, no clouds, it’s sunny and if there is anything to
complain about it is that the wind is coming in micro-burst style…warm weather
then a sudden down burst of chilly wind.I have done the best I can to bring in summer proper, no shirt and
shorts, but it is not easy work.

Ok, so where is the action, where is the story that has
prompted me to finally write.Well it
is a little off color today, and I will preface this to all our alternative
lifestyle friends,it is just funny.

The Barbary Coast YC is in Ayala cove today.We know several of the members, and each one
are very nice, and if not good friends, friends just the same.For the most part the group is gay, no issue
there.Unfortunately Lisa and I were
listening on the radio earlier and there was a young lady that had called the
club to wish them good-bye.As normal
protocol would suggest they had called on 16, and were asked to switch
channels.I of course blurted out to
Lisa, “they will go to 69, just wait”.OK, so my wish was granted, and we both started laughing.Pleasantries were passed and they signed off
as the Busy Beavers.Now that is
funny!Again sorry to those offended,
but you just got to go with was makes you laugh.I have no doubt they are in on the name and
didn’t just come up with it because they went to OSU.

So that’s it for now . Again, not much in the way of
action around here, but we are always ready for fun.

This starts the beginning of our new log.We have moved the boat to an anchorage in Sausalito CA.Everything is functioning fine and we have
about 5 more days here at anchor before we leave down the coast.

Both Lisa and I are getting use to the motion and sounds
of the boat as well as the rythem of the chores that need to be performed
daily.So far the generator is
performing well.We started using it
with about 381 hours and the main engine was started with approx 243 hours.The 243 as we know is not correct, but it is
correct since replacing the hour meter.

I have created this section to help us to remember People,
boats and places of particular interest that we may otherwise only mention in
the daily log.The section will not be
indexed but may contain pictures and facts as we see fit.

Ron and Ardis Johnson, Rejoice, HC 43 K;

Met Ron on the HC
website.Seems to have excellent
knowledge of the Channel Islands.Plan on meeting Ron and his wife in July
2004.

Dennis and Betty Bear, Boomerang, Custom Motor
Cruiser.

We found Dennis and Betty at the Moro Bay YC.They were a great couple that had had their
hopes dashed several years ago when Betty came down with MS.They both have a fun outlook on life and it
was great to joke with someone at the dock.

Dino and Cathy Bortolin, HC 43 Ketch, Delphinius,
We met Dino and Cathy for the first time at a Christmas party we held aboard BR.Delphinius must have been a yard mate of
Beyond Reason, as their hull number is 23 and we are 28.Documented build dates are 3 months apart.

Robin and Ken
McCraw, RK_Paramour@yahoo.com,Robin and Ken were near berth mates.They plan on coming to the Sea of Cortez
in 2008.Robin worked at Svendsons and
helped us out with some great discounts,Ken is a wizard with wood and has rebuilt Paramour from the hull
up.Paramour is a Columbia 38.

Don and Celeste
Rock,Another Berth mate from A
dock at Grand Marina.Don owns a marine
repair business and Celeste is a Esthetician, or bikini waxer.Great people with diverse skills and very
friendly.While we don’t have their
true emails here are their current contact information.Fixit@srmarine.com,

Norm and Karen,
the mayors of A Dock.Just great
people.Karen donated their boat many
times for last minute dock parties.

Linda and Doug
Simms,Owners of Aquadisiac, Tayana
37,

James W. Schock,Owner of Galadrin Entertainment,Novelist, Emmy award winning TV producer and
a nice guy to boot.Met Jim at the Sausalito Yacht Club.He was as nice as can be and helped us out
when we needed a mooring and water.Nobody else in Sausalito
would help us.1jimschock@sbcglobal.net, Jim@schock.com,

In this section I hope to detail some of the more
interesting equipment I have seen in our travels.Some of these may or may not be useful but
at some time I thought they were cool.

Argosy, Fender
Holders.1-800-848-4067.These were interesting.The apparent construction is a piece of
Stainless Steel encased in heavy leather with sheepskin on the underside.The holders are custom made to the size of
your cap rails.The company that stocks
the holders is named The Olde Boat House in NH.603-569-0095

Beyond Reasons Flag Pole.I will include photos on this later.Dims are from the base, 6’4” long.Base is 4” at 1.25” and 2 inches at the base.Flag staff will taper to 1” round where flag
begins at 26 ” from the end leaving 4’ for flag plus 2 inches at the top prior
to the brass ball.

Delran Sheaves can be found at zephyrwerks, www.zephyrwerks.com.
They come with bronze bushings.

Tiawan Faucet Washers:Located these with the help of Steve Cartesian from HCOA.The company the manufactures the washers
for the head sink is Drytheair.com, PO
box 402, Preston WA 98050-0402.The parts or washers part RP-200 are fairly
expensive at about $7 per pair, but they work!We store our spares with the pipe fittings.

.In this section
I do hope to put in tried and true recipes that work on the boat.Many of course will be plagiarized from
corporate or personal recipes of folks we have met along the way, but the way I
cook I could never be accused of duplicating anything so I think we are OK and
will just call it flattery.

Bread:This
is the first bread recipe that we have used that actually worked. It is easy to
use and takes little time and effort.Great to make just before a dingy ride no kneading required:

3 ¼ cups all-purpose flour1 ¼ oz quick rise yeast/ 2 ¼ tsp

1 ½tbls sugar½
tbsp salt

1 ½ cup warm water 1 tbsp oil

Oven 375 “yield 1 loaf

In large mixer bowl, combine ½ flour, yeast, sugar and
salt.Mix well.Add warm water and oil to flour mixture,
blend at low speed.Beat for 3 minutes
then gradually add remaining flour to make a stiff batter.Cover and let rise until almost
doubled.

Stir down batter with a
spoon, and place in grease pan.Cover
and let rise until batter reaches top of pan, 20-30 minutes.Bake in preheated 375 oven for 35-40 minutes
or until brown.

·As and alternative you can substitute this mix
with normal 1/1 part sour dough mix of 1 part flour and 1 part water the
following way:

2 cups of sour dough
mix½ cup warm water

2 ½ cups flour1
½ tbs sugar

1 packet of yeast½
Tsp salt

1 Tbs OilFollow
regular directions

Pancakes:We
discovered this recipe on the web when Lisa had a craving for banana pancakes.I didn’t add the bananas to the recipe as I
know there will be other fruit that she will want to try in the future.This particular recipe does not require eggs
or actual milk.

1 ¾cups flour

½ cup sugar

½ cup powdered milk or
coffee creamer

1 tbls baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

2 cups warm water

1 tsp vanilla

Cinnamon and nutmeg to
taste.

Mix and eat’em up.

Dog Biscuits:We
had just barely met this couple from Alameda YC and about two months later that
brought these biscuits and the recipe over to us.Sparks
really likes them.

Before you even start, understand that I spent the better
part of my early childhood in my room writing poetry and aspiring to become a
writer, Oracle or enlightened drug taker.With some fortune I missed the latter and to my dismay haven’t made the
first two by a fairly long shot.

Here is just a gathering of some of the “stuff” I have
collected that if nothing else takes me to a place that I like to remember.

Lord, make
me an instrument of Thy peace;
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood, as to understand;
to be loved, as to love;
for it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life

"To be
truly challenging, a voyage, like a life, must rest on a firm foundation of
financial unrest. Otherwise, you are doomed to a routine traverse, the kind
known to yachtsmen who play with their boats at sea... "cruising" it
is called. Voyaging belongs to seamen, and to the wanderers of the world who
cannot, or will not, fit in. If you are contemplating a voyage and you have the
means, abandon the venture until your fortunes change. Only then will you know
what the sea is all about.

"I've
always wanted to sail to the south seas, but I can't afford it." What
these men can't afford is not to go. They are enmeshed in the cancerous
discipline of "security." And in the worship of security we fling our
lives beneath the wheels of routine - and before we know it our lives are gone.

What does a
man need - really need? A few pounds of food each day, heat and shelter,
six feet to lie down in - and some form of working activity that will yield a
sense of accomplishment. That's all - in the material sense, and we know it.
But we are brainwashed by our economic system until we end up in a tomb beneath
a pyramid of time payments, mortgages, preposterous gadgetry, playthings that
divert our attention for the sheer idiocy of the charade.

The years
thunder by. The dreams of youth grow dim where they lie caked in dust on the
shelves of patience. Before we know it, the tomb is sealed.